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THE GIRL IN THE 
GOLDEN ATOM 


BY 

RAY CUMMINGS 



* > » 


Publishers 

Harper & Brothers 
New York and London 
MCMXXIII 

















Printed in the U. S. A. 


i-x 


'i - 'i°\ 5 X 


n b 


TO 

MY FRIEND AND MENTOR 

ROBERT H. DAVIS 

WITH GRATEFUL ACKNOWLEDGMENT OF 
HIS ENCOURAGEMENT AND PRACTICAL 
ASSISTANCE TO WHICH I OWE MY 
INITIAL SUCCESS 















CONTENTS 


CHAPTER p AQa 

I. A Universe in an Atom .i 

II. Into the Ring .n 

III. After Forty-eight Hours .... 22 

IV. Lylda. • • • 33 

V. The World in the Ring.40 

VI. Strategy and Kisses.50 

VII. A Modern Gulliver .... *55 

/III. “I Must Go Back” '.62 

IX. After Five Years.71 

X. Testing the Drugs .... -77 

XI. The Escape of the Drug .... 89 

XII. The Start.96 

XIII. Perilous Ways.107 

XIV. Strange Experiences.114 

XV. The Valley of the Scratch . . .121 

XVI. The Pit of Darkness.129 

XVII. The Welcome of the Master . . . 137 

XVIII. The Chemist and His Son .... 144 

XIX. The City of Arite.152 

XX. The World of the Ring.160 

XXI. A Life Worth Living.171 

XXII. The Trial.181 










Contents 


chapter page 

XXIII. Lylda’s Plan. 19 1 

XXIV. Lylda Acts. 199 

XXV. The Escape of Targo.206 

XXVI. The Abduction.216 

XXVII. Aura .224 

XXVIII. The Attack on the Palace .... 234 

XXIX. On the Lake ........ 242 

XXX. Word Music.248 

XXXI. The Palace of Orlog.254 

XXXII. An Ant-hill Outraged.262 

XXXIII. The Rescue of Loto.269 

XXXIV. The Decision.277 

XXXV. Good-bye to Arite.283 

XXXVI. The Fight in the Tunnels . . . 291 

XXXVII. A Combat of Titans.299 

XXXVIII. Lost in Size.307 

XXXIX. A Modern Dinosaur. 319 

XL. The Adventurers’ Return .... 329 

XLI. The First Christmas.333 















The Girl in the 
Golden Atom 



THE GIRL IN THE 
GOLDEN ATOM 


CHAPrER 1 

A UNIVERSE IN AN ATOM 

^^TTVHEN you mean to say there is no such thing 
as the smallest particle of matter?” asked the 

Doctor. 

“You can put it that way if you like,” the Chemist 
replied. “In other words, what I believe is that things 
can be infinitely small just as well as they can be infinitely 
large. Astronomers tell us of the immensity of space. 
I have tried to imagine space as finite. It is impossible. 
How can you conceive the edge of space? Something 
must be beyond—something or nothing, and even that 
would be more space, wouldn’t it?” 

“Gosh,” said the Very Young Man, and lighted an¬ 
other cigarette. 

The Chemist resumed, smiling a little. “Now, if it 
seems probable that there is no limit to the immensity of 
space, why should we make its smallness finite? How 
can you say that the atom cannot be divided? As a mat¬ 
ter of fact, it already has been. The most powerful mi¬ 
croscope will show you realms of smallness to which you 
can penetrate no other way. Multiply that power a 
thousand times, or ten thousand times, and who shall say 
what you will see?” 

The Chemist paused, and looked at the intent little 
group around him. 


l 


2 


The Girl in the Golden Atom 


He was a youngish man, with large features and horn¬ 
rimmed glasses, his rough English-cut clothes hanging 
loosely over his broad, spare frame. The Banker drained 
his glass and rang for the waiter. 

“Very interesting/' he remarked. 

“Don’t be an ass, George/’ said the Big Business Man. 
“Just because you don’t understand, doesn’t mean there 
is no sense to it.” 

“What I don’t get clearly”—began the Doctor. 

“None of it’s clear to me,” said the Very Young Man. 

The Doctor crossed under the light and took an easier 
chair. “You intimated you had discovered something 
unusual in these realms of the infinitely small,” he sug¬ 
gested, sinking back luxuriously. “Will you tell us about 
it?” 

“Yes, if you like,” said the Chemist, turning from one 
to the other. A nod of assent followed his glance, as 
each settled himself more comfortably. 

“Well, gentlemen, when you say I have discovered 
something unusual in another world—in the world of the 
infinitely small—you are right in a way. I have seen 
something and lost it. You won’t believe me probably,” 
he glanced at the Banker an instant, “but that is not im¬ 
portant. I am going to tell you the facts, just as they 
happened.” 

The Big Business Man filled up the glasses all around, 
and the Chemist resumed: 

“It was in 1910, this problem first came to interest me. 
I had never gone in for microscopic work very much, but 
now I let it absorb all my attention. I secured larger, 
more powerful instruments—I spent most of my money,” 
he smiled ruefully, “but never could I come to the end of 
the space into which I was looking. Something was al¬ 
ways hidden beyond—something I could almost, but not 
qui'e, distinguish. 


A Universe in an Atom 3 

“Then I realized that I was on the wrong track. My 
instrument was not merely of insufficient power, it was 
not one-thousandth the power I needed. 

“So I began to study the laws of optics and lenses. In 
1913 I went abroad, and with one of the most famous 
lens-makers of Europe I produced a lens of an entirely 
different quality, a lens that I hoped would give me what 
I wanted. So I returned here and fitted up my micro¬ 
scope that I knew would prove vastly more powerful than 
any yet constructed. 

“It was finally completed and set up in my laboratory, 
and one night I went in alone to look through it for the 
first time. It was in the fall of 1914, I remember, just 
after the first declaration of war. 

“I can recall now my feelings at that moment. I was 
about to see into another world, to behold what no man 
had ever looked on before. What would I see? What 
new realms was I, first of all our human race, to enter? 
With furiously beating heart, I sat down before the huge 
instrument and adjusted the eyepiece. 

“Then I glanced around for some object to examine. 
O11 my finger I had a ring, my mother’s wedding ring, 
and I decided to use that. I have it here.” He took a 
plain gold band from his little finger and laid it on the 
table. 

“You will see a slight mark on the outside. That is 
the place into which I looked.” 

His friends crowded around the table and examined a 
scratch on one side of the band. 

“What did you see?” asked the Very Young Man ea- 
gerly. 

“Gentlemen,” resumed the Chemist, “what I saw stag¬ 
gered even my own imagination. With trembling hands 
I put the ring in place, looking directly down into that 
scratch. For a moment I saw nothing:. I was like a 




4 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

person coming suddenly out of the sunlight into a dark¬ 
ened room. I knew there was something visible in my 
view, but my eyes did not seem able to receive the im¬ 
pressions. I realize now they were not yet adjusted to 
the new form of light. Gradually, as I looked, objects of 
definite shape began to emerge from the blackness. 

“Gentlemen, I want to make clear to you now—as clear 
as I can—the peculiar aspect of everything that I saw un¬ 
der this microscope. I seemed to be inside an immense 
cave. One side, near at hand, I could now make out quite 
clearly. The walls were extraordinarily rough and in¬ 
dented, with a peculiar phosphorescent light on the pro¬ 
jections and blackness in the hollows. I say phos¬ 
phorescent light, for that is the nearest word I can find 
to describe it—a curious radiation, quite different from 
the reflected light to which we are accustomed. 

“I said that the hollows inside of the cave were black¬ 
ness. But not blackness—the absence of light—as we 
know it. It was a blackness that seemed also to radi¬ 
ate light, if you can imagine such a condition; a black¬ 
ness that seemed not empty, but merely withholding its 
contents just beyond my vision. 

“Except for a dim suggestion of roof over the cave, 
and its floor, I could distinguish nothing. After a mo¬ 
ment this floor became clearer. It seemed to be—well, 
perhaps I might call it black marble—smooth, glossy, yet 
somewhat translucent. In the foreground the floor was 
apparently liquid. In no way did it differ in appearance 
from the solid part, except that its surface seemed to be 
in motion. 

“Another curious thing was the outlines of all the 
shapes in view. I noticed that no outline held steady 
when I looked at it directly ; it seemed to quiver. You 
see something like it when looking at an object through 
water—only, of course, there was no distortion. It was 


A Universe in an Atom 


5 

also like looking at something with the radiation of 
heat between. 

“Of the back and other side of the cave, I could see 
nothing, except in one place, where a narrow effulgence 
of light drifted out into the immensity of the distance 
behind. 

“I do not know how long I sat looking at this scene; 
it may have been several hours. Although I was ob¬ 
viously in a cave, I never felt shut in—never got the im- 
. pression of being in a narrow, confined space. 

“On the contrary, after a time I seemed to feel the 
vast immensity of the blackness before me. I think per¬ 
haps it may have been that path of light stretching out 
into the distance. As I looked it seemed like the reversed 
tail of a comet, or the dim glow of the Milky Way, and 
penetrating to equally remote realms of space. 

“Perhaps I fell asleep, or at least there was an interval 
of time during which I was so absorbed in my own 
thoughts I was hardly conscious of the scene before 
me. 

“Then I became aware of a dim shape in the fore¬ 
ground—a shape merged with the outlines surrounding 
it. And as I looked, it gradually assumed form, and I 
saw it was the figure of a young girl, sitting beside the 
liquid pool. Except for the same waviness of outline 
and phosphorescent glow, she had quite the normal aspect 
of a human being of our own world. She was beautiful, 
according to our own standards of beauty; her long 
braided hair a glowing black, her face, delicate of feature 
and winsome in expression. Her lips were a deep red, 
although I felt rather than saw the colour. 

“She was dressed only in a short tunic of a substance 
I might describe as gray opaque glass, and the pearly 
whiteness of her skin gleamed with iridescence. 

“She seemed to be singing, although I heard no sound. 








6 


The Girl in the Golden Atom 


Once she bent over the pool and plunged her hand into it, 
laughing gaily. 

‘‘Gentlemen, I cannot make you appreciate my emotions, 
when all at once I remembered I was looking through a 
microscope. I had forgotten entirely my situation, ab¬ 
sorbed in the scene before me. And then, abruptly, a 
great realization came upon me—the realization that 
everything I saw was inside that ring. I was unnerved 
for the moment at the importance of my discovery. 

“When I looked again, after the few moments my eye 
took to become accustomed to the new form of light, the 
scene showed itself as before, except that the girl had 
gone. 

“For over a week, each night at the same time I 
watched that cave. The girl came always, and sat by the 
pool as I had first seen her. Once she danced with the 
wild grace of a wood nymph, whirling in and out the 
shadows, and falling at last in a little heap beside the pool. 

“It was on the tenth night after I had first seen her 
that the accident happened. I had been watching, I re¬ 
member, an unusually long time before she appeared, glid¬ 
ing out of the shadows. She seemed in a different mood, 
pensive and sad, as she bent down over the pool, staring 
into it intently. Suddenly there was a tremendous crack¬ 
ing sound, sharp as an explosion, and I was thrown back¬ 
ward upon the floor. 

“When I recovered consciousness—I must have struck 
my head on something—I found the microscope in ruins. 
Upon examination I saw that its larger lens had exploded 
—flown into fragments scattered around the room. Why 
I was not killed I do not understand. The ring I picked 
up from the floor; it was unharmed and unchanged. 

“Can I make you understand how I felt at this loss? 
Because of the war in Europe I knew I could never re- 


A Universe in an Atom 


7 

place my lens—for many years, at any rate. And then, 
gentlemen, came the most terrible feeling of all; I knew 
at last that the scientific achievement I had made and lost 
counted for little with me. It was the girl. I realized 
then that the only being I ever could care for was living 
out her life with her world, and, indeed, her whole uni¬ 
verse, in an atom of that ring.” 

The Chemist stopped talking and looked from one to 
the other of the tense faces of his companions. 

“It’s almost too big an idea to grasp,” murmured the 
Doctor. 

“What caused the explosion?” asked the Very Young 
Man. 

“I do not know.” The Chemist addressed his reply to 
the Doctor, as the most understanding of the group. “I 
can appreciate, though, that through that lens I was mag¬ 
nifying tremendously those peculiar light-radiations that 
I have described. I believe the molecules of the lens 
were shattered by them—I had exposed it longer to them 
that evening than any of the others.” 

The Doctor nodded his comprehension of this theory. 

Impressed in spite of himself, the Banker took another 
drink and leaned forward in his chair. “Then you really 
think that there is a girl now inside the gold of that 
ring?” he asked. 

“He didn’t say that necessarily,” interrupted the Big 
Business Man. 

“Yes, he did.” 

“As a matter of fact, I do believe that to be the case,” 
said the Chemist earnestly. “I believe that every particle 
of matter in our universe contains within it an equally 
complex and complete a universe, which to its inhabitants 
seems as large as ours. I think, also that the whole realm 
of our interplanetary space, our solar system and all the 


8 


The Girl in the Golden Atom 


remote stars of the heavens are contained within the atom 
of some other universe as gigantic to us as we are to the 
■universe in that ring.” 

“Gosh!” said the Very Young Man. 

“It doesn’t make one feel very important in the scheme 
of things, does it?” remarked the Big Business Man 
dryly. 

The Chemist smiled. “The existence of no individual, 
no nation, no world, nor any one universe is of the least 
importance.” 

“Then it would be possible,” said the Doctor, “for 
this gigantic universe that contains us in one of its atoms, 
to be itself contained within the atom of another uni¬ 
verse, still more gigantic, and so on.” 

“That is my theory,” said the Chemist. 

“And in each of the atoms of the rocks of that cave 
there may be other worlds proportionately minute?” 

“I can see no reason to doubt it.” 

“Well, there is no proof, anyway,” said the Banker. 
“We might as well believe it.” 

“I intend to get proof,” said the Chemist. 

“Do you believe all these innumerable universes, both 
larger and smaller than ours, are inhabited?” asked the 
Doctor. 

“I should think probably most of them are. The exis¬ 
tence of life, I believe, is as fundamental as the existence 
of matter without life.” 

“How do you suppose that girl got in there?” asked the 
Very Young Man, coming out of a brown study. 

“What puzzled me,” resumed the Chemist, ignoring the 
question, “is why the girl should so resemble our own 
race. I have thought about it a good deal, and I have 
reached the conclusion that the inhabitants of any universe 
in the next smaller or larger plane to ours probably re¬ 
semble us fairly closely. That ring, you see, is in the 


A Universe in an Atom 9 

same—shall we say—environment as ourselves. The 
same forces control it that control us. Now, if the ring 
had been created on Mars, for instance, I believe that the 
universes within its atoms would be inhabited by beings 
like the Martians—if Mars has any inhabitants. Of 
course, in planes beyond those next to ours, either smaller 
or larger, changes would probably occur, becoming 
greater as you go in or out from our own universe/’ 

“Good Lord! It makes one dizzy to think of it,” said 
the Big Business Man. 

“I wish I knew how that girl got in there,” sighed the 
Very Young Man, looking at the ring. 

“She probably didn’t,” retorted the Doctor. “Very 
likely she was created there, the same as you were here.” 

“I think that is probably so,” said the Chemist. “And 
yet, sometimes I am not at all sure. She was very hu¬ 
man.” The Very Young Man looked at him sympa¬ 
thetically. 

“How are you going to prove your theories ?” asked the 
Banker, in his most irritatingly practical way. 

The Chemist picked up the ring and put it on his 
finger. “Gentlemen,” he said. “I have tried to tell you 
facts, not theories. What I saw through that ultramicro¬ 
scope was not an unproven theory, but a fact. My theo¬ 
ries you have brought out by your questions.” 

“You are quite right,” said the Doctor; '‘but you did 
mention yourself that you hoped to provide proof.” 

The Chemist hesitated a moment, then made his de¬ 
cision. “I will tell you the rest,” he said. 

“After the destruction of the miscroscope, I was quite 
at a loss how to proceed. I thought about the problem 
for many weeks. Finally I decided to work along an¬ 
other altogether different line—a theory about which I am 
surprised you have not already questioned me.” 

He paused, but no one spoke. 


io The Girl in the Golden Atom 

“I am hardly ready with proof to-night/' he resumed 
after a moment. ‘‘Will you all take dinner with me here 
at the club one week from to-night?” He read affirma¬ 
tion in the glance of each. 

“Good. That’s settled,” he said, rising. “At seven, 
then.” 

“But what was the theory you expected us to question 
you about?” asked the Very Young Man. 

The Chemist leaned on the back of his chair. 

“The only solution I could see to the problem,” he 
said slowly, “was to find some way of making myself 
sufficiently small to be able to enter that other universe. 
I have found such a way and one week from to-night, 
gentlemen, with your assistance, I am going to enter the 
surface of that ring at the point where it is scratched!” 


CHAPTER II 


INTO THE RING 

T HE cigars were lighted and dinner over before the 
Doctor broached the subject uppermost in the 
minds of every member of the party. 

“A toast, gentlemen,” he said, raising his glass. “To 
the greatest research chemist in the world. May he be 
successful in his adventure to-night.” 

The Chemist bowed his acknowledgment. 

“You have not heard me yet,” he said smiling. 

“But we want to,” said the Very Young Man im¬ 
pulsively. 

“And you shall.” He settled himself more comfort¬ 
ably in his chair. “Gentlemen, I am going to tell you, 
first, as simply as possible, just what I have done in the 
past two years. You must draw your own conclusions 
from the evidence I give you. 

“You will remember that I told you last week of my 
dilemna after the destruction of the microscope. Its loss 
and the impossibility of replacing it, led me into still 
bolder plans than merely the visual examination of this 
minute world. I reasoned, as I have told you, that be¬ 
cause of its physical proximity, its similar environment, 
so to speak, this outer world should be capable of sup¬ 
porting life identical with our own. 

“By no process of reasoning can I find adequate refu¬ 
tation of this theory. Then, again, I had the evidence of 
my own eyes to prove that a being I could not tell from 
one of my own kind was living there. That this girl, 

ii 


12 


The Girl in the Golden Atom 


other than in size, differs radically from those of our 
race, I cannot believe. 

“I saw then but one obstacle standing between me and 
this other world—the discrepancy of size. The distance 
separating our world from this other is infinitely great or 
infinitely small, according to the viewpoint. In my pres¬ 
ent size it is only a few feet from here to the ring on that 
plate. But to an inhabitant of that other world, we are 
as remote as the faintest stars of the heavens, dimin¬ 
ished a thousand times.” 

He paused a moment, signing the waiter to leave the 
room. 

“This reduction of bodily size, great as it is, involves 
no deeper principle than does a light contraction of tis¬ 
sue, except that it must be carried further. The prob¬ 
lem, then, was to find a chemical, sufficiently unharmful 
to life, that would so act upon the body cells as to cause a 
reduction in bulk, without changing their shape. I had 
to secure a uniform and also a proportionate rate of 
contraction of each cell, in order not to have the body 
shape altered. 

“After a comparatively small amount of research work, 

I encountered an apparently insurmountable obstacle. As 
you know, gentlemen, our living human bodies are helcE 
together by the power of the central intelligence we call 
the mind. Every instant during your lifetime your sub¬ 
conscious mind is commanding and directing the indi¬ 
vidual life of each cell that makes up your body. At 
death this power is withdrawn; each cell is thrown un¬ 
der its own individual command, and dissolution of the 
body takes place. 

“I found, therefore, that I could not act upon the cells 
separately, so long as they were under control of the mind. 
On the other hand, I could not withdraw this power of 
the subconscious mind without causing death. 


Into the Ring 13 

“I progressed no further than this for several months. 
Then came the solution. I reasoned that after death the 
body does not immediately disintegrate; far more time 
elapses than I expected to need for the cell-contraction. I 
devoted my time, then to finding a chemical that would 
temporarily withhold, during the period of cell-contrac¬ 
tion, the power of the subconscious mind, just as the 
power of the conscious mind is withheld by hypnotism. 

“I am not going to weary you by trying to lead you 
through the maze of chemical experiments into which I 
plunged. Only one of you,” he indicated the Doctor, 
“has the technical basis of knowledge to follow me. No 
one had been before me along the path I traversed. I 
pursued the method of pure theoretical deduction, draw¬ 
ing my conclusions from the practical results obtained. 

“I worked on rabbits almost exclusively. After a few 
weeks I succeeded in completely suspending animation 
in one of them for several hours. There was no life ap¬ 
parently existing during that period. It was not a trance 
or coma, but the complete simulation of death. No harm¬ 
ful results followed the revivifying of the animal. The 
contraction of the cells was far more difficult to accom¬ 
plish ; I finished my last experiment less than six months 
ago.” 

“Then you really have been able to make an animal 
infinitely small?” asked the Big Business Man. 

The Chemist smiled. “I sent four rabbits into the un¬ 
known last week,” he said. 

“What did they look like going?” asked the Very 
Young Man. The Chemist signed him to be patient. 

“The quantity of diminution to be obtained bothered 
me considerably. Exactly how small that other universe 
is, I had no means of knowing, except by the computa¬ 
tions I made of the magnifying power of my lens. 
These figures, I know, must necessarily be very inac- 


14 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

curate. Then, again, I have no means of judging by the 
visual rate of diminution of these rabbits, whether this 
contraction is at a uniform rate or accelerated. Nor can 
I tell how long it is prolonged, for the quantity of drug 
administered, as only a fraction of the diminution has 
taken place when the animal passes beyond the range of 
any microscope I now possess. 

“These questions were overshadowed, however, by a 
far more serious problem that encompassed them all. 

“As I was planning to project myself into this un¬ 
known universe and to reach the exact size proportionate 
to it, I soon realized such a result could not be obtained 
were I in an unconscious state. Only by successive doses 
of the drug, or its retardent about which I will tell you 
later, could I hope to reach the proper size. Another 
necessity is that I place myself on the exact spot on that 
ring where I wish to enter and to climb down among 
its atoms when I have become sufficiently small to do so. 
Obviously, this would be impossible to one not possessing 
all his faculties and physical strength.’’ 

“And did you solve that problem, too?” asked the 
Banker. 

“I’d like to see it done,” he added, reading his an¬ 
swer in the other's confident smile. 

4 

The Chemist produced two small paper packages from 
his wallet. “These drugs are the result of my research,” 
he said. “One of them causes contraction, and the other 
expansion, by an exact reversal of the process. Taken 
together, they produce no effect, and a lesser amount of 
one retards the action of the other.” He opened the 
papers, showing two small vials. “I have made them as 
you see, in the form of tihy pills, each containing a mi¬ 
nute quantity of the drug. It is by taking them succes¬ 
sively in unequal amounts that I expect to reach the de¬ 
sired size.” 


Into the Ring 15 

“There’s one point that you do not mention,’’ said the 
Doctor. “Those vials and their contents will have to 
change size as you do. How are you going to manage 
that?” 

“By experimentation I have found,” answered the 
Chemist, “that any object held in close physical contact 
with the living body being contracted is contracted itself 
at an equal rate. I believe that my clothes will be af¬ 
fected also. These vials I will carry strapped under my 
armpits.” 

“Suppose you should die, or be killed, would the con¬ 
traction cease?” asked the Doctor. 

“Yes, almost immediately,” replied the Chemist. “Ap¬ 
parently, though I am acting through the subconscious 
mind while its power is held in abeyance, when this power 
is permanently withdrawn by death, the drug no longer 
affects the individual cells. The contraction or expansion 
ceases almost at once.” 

The Chemist cleared a space before him on the table. 
“In a well-managed club like this,” he said, “there should 
be no flies, but I see several around. Do you suppose we 
can catch one of them?” 

“I can,” said the Very Young Man, and forthwith he 
did. 

The Chemist moistened a lump of sugar and laid it 
on the table before him. Then, selecting one of the 
smallest of the pills, he ground it to powder with the 
back of a spoon and sprinkled this powder on the 
sugar. 

“Will you give me the fly, please?” 

The Very Young Man gingerly did so. The Chemist 
held the insect by its wings over the sugar. “Will some¬ 
one lend me one of his shoes?” 

The Very Young Man hastily slipped off a dancing 
pump. 


16 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

“Thank you/' said the Chemist, placing it on the table 
with a quizzical smile. 

The rest of the company rose from their chairs and 
gathered around, watching with interested faces what was 
about to happen. 

“I hope he is hungry,” remarked the Chemist, and 
placed the fly gently down on the sugar, still holding 
it by the wings. The insect, after a moment, ate a 
little. 

Silence fell upon the group as each watched intently. 
For a few moments nothing happened. Then, almost 
imperceptibly at first, the fly became larger. In another 
minute it was the size of a large horse-fly, struggling to 
release its wings from the Chemist’s grasp. A minute 
more and it was the size of a beetle. No one spoke. 
The Banker moistened his lips, drained his glass hur¬ 
riedly and moved slightly farther away. Still the insect 
grew; now it was the size of a small chicken, the multiple 
lens of its eyes presenting a most terrifying aspect, while 
its ferocious droning reverberated through the room. 
Then suddenly the Chemist threw it upon the table, cov¬ 
ered it with a napkin, and beat it violently with the slip¬ 
per. When all movement had ceased he tossed its quiv¬ 
ering body into a corner of the room. 

“Good God!” ejaculated the Banker, as the white-faced 
men stared at each other. The quiet voice of the Chemist 
brought them back to themselves. “That, gentlemen, you 
must understand, was only a fraction of the very first 
stage of growth. As you may have noticed, it was con¬ 
stantly accelerated. This acceleration attains a speed of 
possibly fifty thousand times that you observed. Beyond 
that, it is my theory, the change is at a uniform rate.” 
He looked at the body of the fly, lying inert on the floor. 
“You can appreciate now, gentlemen, the importance of 
having this growth cease after death.” 


Into the Ring ly 

“Good Lord, I should say so!” murmured the Big Busi¬ 
ness Man, mopping his forehead. The Chemist took the 
lump of sugar and threw it into the open fire. 

“Gosh!” said the Very Young Man, “suppose when we 
were not looking, another fly had-” 

“Shut up!” growled the Banker. 

“Not so skeptical now, eh, George?” said the Big Busi¬ 
ness Alan. 

“Can you catch me another fly?” asked the Chemist. 
The Very Young Man hastened to do so. “The second 
demonstration, gentlemen,” said the Chemist, “is less 
spectacular, but far more pertinent than the one you have 
just witnessed.” He took the fly by the wings, and pre¬ 
pared another lump of sugar, sprinkling a crushed pill 
from the other vial upon it. 

“When he is small enough I am going to try to put him 
on the ring, if he will stay still,” said the Chemist. 

The Doctor pulled the plate containing the ring for¬ 
ward until it was directly under the light, and every one 
crowded closer to watch; already the fly was almost too 
small to be held. The Chemist tried to set it on the 
ring, but could not; so with his other hand he brushed it 
lightly into the plate, where it lay, a tiny black speck 
against the gleaming whiteness of the china. 

“Watch it carefully, gentlemen," he said, as they bent 
closer. 

“It’s gone,” said the Big Business Man. 

“No, I can still see it,” said the Doctor. Then he 
raised the plate closer to his face. “Now it’s gone,” he 
said. 

The Chemist sat down in his chair. “It’s probably 
still there, only too small for you to see. In a few 
minutes, if it took a sufficient amount of the drug, it will 
be small enough to fall between the molecules of the 
plate.” 



18 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

“Do you suppose it will find another inhabited uni¬ 
verse down there?” asked the Very Young Man. 

“Who knows,” smiled the Chemist. “Very possibly 
it will. But the one we are interested in is here,” he 
added, touching the ring. 

“Is it your intention to take this stuff yourself to¬ 
night?” asked the Big Business Man. 

“If you will give me your help, I think so, yes. I have 
made all arrangements. The club has given us this room 
in absolute privacy for forty-eight hours. Your meals 
will be served here when you want them, and I am going 
to ask you, gentlemen, to take turns watching and guard¬ 
ing the ring during that time. Will you do it?” 

“I should say we would,” cried the Doctor, and the 
others nodded assent. 

“It is because I wanted you to be convinced of my 
entire sincerity that I have taken you so thoroughly into 
my confidence. Are those doors locked?” The Very 
Young Man locked them. 

“Thank you,” said the Chemist, starting to disrobe. 
In a moment he stood before them attired in a woolen 
bathing-suit of pure white. Over his shoulders was 
strapped tightly a narrow leather harness, supporting two 
silken pockets, one under each armpit. Into each of these 
he placed one of the vials, first laying four pills from 
one of them upon the table. 

At this point the Banker rose from his chair and se¬ 
lected another in the further corner of the room. He 
sank into it a crumpled heap and wiped the beads of 
perspiration from his face with a shaking hand. 

“I have every expectation,” said the Chemist, “that 
this suit and harness will contract in size uniformly with 
me. If the harness should not, then I shall have to hold 
the vials in my hand.” 

On the table, directly under the light, he spread a large 


Into the Ring 19 

silk handkerchief, upon which he placed the ring. He 
then produced a teaspoon, which he handed to the Doctor. 

"Please listen carefully,” he said, "for perhaps the 
whole success of my adventure, and my life itself, may de¬ 
pend upon your actions during the next few minutes. 
You will realize, of course, that when I am still large 
enough to be visible to you I shall be so small that my 
voice may be inaudible. Therefore, I want you to know, 
now, just what to expect. 

"When I am something under a foot high, I shall step 
upon that handkerchief, where you will see my white suit 
plainly against its black surface. When I become less 
than an inch high, I shall run over to the ring and stand 
beside it. When I have diminished to about a quarter 
of an inch, I shall climb upon it, and, as I get smaller, 
will follow its surface until I come to the scratch. 

"I want you to watch me very closely. I may miscal¬ 
culate the time and wait until I am too small to climb 
upon the ring. Or I may fall off. In either case, you 
will place that spoon beside me and I will climb into it. 
You will then do your best to help me get on the ring. Is 
all this quite clear?” 

The Doctor nodded assent. 

"Very well, watch me as long as I remain visible. If 
I have an accident, I shall take the other drug and en¬ 
deavor to return to you at once. This you must expect 
at any moment during the next forty-eight hours. Un¬ 
der all circumstances, if I am alive, I shall return at the 
expiration of that time. 

"And, gentlemen, let me caution you most solemnly, do 
not allow that ring to be touched until that length of time 
has expired. Can I depend on you?” 

"Yes,” they answered breathlessly. 

"After I have taken the pills,” the Chemist continued, 
“I shall not speak unless it is absolutely necessary. I 


20 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

do not know what my sensations will be, and I want to 
follow them as closely as possible." He then turned out 
all the lights in the room with the exception of the center 
electrolier, that shone down directly on the handkerchief 
and ring. 

The Chemist looked about him. “Good-by, gentle¬ 
men," he said, shaking hands all round. “Wish me luck," 
and without hesitation he placed the four pills in his 
mouth and washed them down with a swallow of water. 

Silence fell on the group as the Chemist seated himself 
and covered his face with his hands. For perhaps two 
minutes the tenseness of the silence was unbroken, save 
by the heavy breathing of the Banker as he lay huddled 
in his chair. 

“Oh, my God! He is growing smaller!" whispered 
the Big Business Man in a horrified tone to the Doctor. 
The Chemist raised his head and smiled at them. Then 
he stood up, steadying himself against a chair. He was 
less than four feet high. Steadily he grew smaller be¬ 
fore their horrified eyes. Once he made as if to speak, 
and the Doctor knelt down beside him. “It’s all right, 
good-by," he said in a tiny voice. 

Then he stepped upon the handkerchief. The Doctor 
knelt on the floor beside it, the wooden spoon ready in 
his hand, while the others, except the Banker, stood be¬ 
hind him. The figure of the Chemist, standing motion¬ 
less near the edge of the handkerchief, seemed now like 
a little white wooden toy, hardly more than an inch in 
height. 

Waving his hand and smiling, he suddenly started to 
walk and then ran swiftly over to the ring. By the time 
he reached it, somewhat out of breath, he was little more 
than twice as high as the width of its band. Without 
pausing, he leaped up, and sat astraddle, leaning over and 
holding to it tightly with his hands. In another mo- 


21 


Into the Ring 

ment he was on his feet, on the upper edge of the ring, 
walking carefully along its circumference towards the 
scratch. 

The Big Business Man touched the Doctor on the 
shoulder and tried to smile. “He’s making it,” he whis¬ 
pered. As if in answer the little figure turned and waved 
its arms. They could just distinguish its white outline 
against the gold surface underneath. 

“I don’t see him,” said the Very Young Man in a 
scared voice. 

“He’s right near the scratch,” answered the Doctor, 
bending closer. Then, after a moment, “He’s gone.” 
He rose to his feet. “Good Lord! Why haven’t we a 
microscope!” 

“I never thought of that,” said the Big Business Man, 
“we could have watched him for a long time yet.” 

“Well, he’s gone now,” returned the Doctor, “and there 
is nothing for us to do but wait.” 

“I hope he finds that girl,” sighed the Very Young 
Man, as he sat chin in hand beside the handkerchief. 


CHAPTER III 


AFTER FORTY-EIGHT HOURS 

T HE Banker snored stertorously from his mattress 
in a corner of the room. In an easy-chair near by, 
with his feet on the table, lay the Very Young Man, 
sleeping also. 

The Doctor and the Big Business Man sat by the hand¬ 
kerchief conversing in low tones. 

“How long has it been now?” asked the latter. 

“Just forty hours,” answered the Doctor; “and he said 
that forty-eight hours was the limit. He should come 
back at about ten to-night.” 

“I wonder if he will come back,” questioned the Big 
Business Man nervously. “Lord, I wish he wouldn’t 
snore so loud,” he added irritably, nodding in the direc¬ 
tion of the Banker. 

They were silent for a moment, and then he went on: 
“You’d better try to sleep a little while, Frank. You’re 
worn out. I’ll watch here.” 

“I suppose I should,” answered the Doctor wearily. 
“Wake up that kid, he’s sleeping most of the time.” 

“No, I’ll watch,” repeated the Big Business Man. 
“You lie down over there.” 

The Doctor did so while the other settled himself more 
comfortably on a cushion beside the handkerchief, and 
prepared for his lonely watching. 

The Doctor apparently dropped off to sleep at once, 
for he did not speak again. The Big Business Man sat 

staring steadily at the ring, bending nearer to it occa- 

22 


After Forty-Eight Hours 23 

sionaUy. Every ten or fifteen minutes he looked at his 
watch. 

Perhaps an hour passed in this way, when the Very 
Young Man suddenly sat up and yawned. “Haven’t they 
come back yet?” he asked in a sleepy voice. 

The Big Business Man answered in a much lower tone. 
“What do you mean—they?” 

“I dreamed that he brought the girl back with him,” 
said the Very Young Man. 

“Well, if he did, they have not arrived. You’d better 
go back to sleep. We’ve got six or seven hours yet— 
maybe more.” 

The Very Young Man rose and crossed the room. 
“No, I’ll watch a while,” he said, seating himself on the 
floor. “What time is it?” 

“Quarter to three.” 

“He said he’d be back by ten to-night. I’m crazy to 
see that girl.” 

The Big Business Man rose and went over to a dinner- 
tray, standing near the door. “Lord, I'm hungry. I 
must have forgotten to eat to-day.” He lifted up one 
of the silver covers. What he saw evidently encouraged 
him, for he drew up a chair and began his lunch. 

The Very Young Man lighted a cigarette. “It will be 
the tragedy of my life,” he said, “if he never comes 
back.” 

The Big Business Man smiled. “How about his life?” 
he answered, but the Very Young Man had fallen into a 
reverie and did not reply. 

The Big Business Man finished his lunch in silence and 
was just about to light a cigar when a sharp exclamation 
brought him hastily to his feet. 

“Come here, quick, I see something.” The Very 
Young Man had his face close to the ring and was trem¬ 
bling violently. 


24 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

The other pushed him back. ‘‘Let me see. Where ?” 

“There, by the scratch; he’s lying there; I can see 
him.” 

The Big Business Man looked and then hurriedly woke 
the Doctor. 

“He’s come back,” he said briefly; “you can see him 
there.” The Doctor bent down over the ring while the 
others woke up the Banker. 

“He doesn’t seem to be getting any bigger,” said the 
Very Young Man; “he’s just lying there. Maybe he’s 
dead.” 

“What shall we do?” asked the Big Business Man, and 
made as if to pick up the ring. The Doctor shoved him 
away. “Don't do that!” he said sharply. “Do you want 
to kill him?” 

“He’s sitting up,” cried the Very Young Man. “He’s 
all right.” 

“He must have fainted,” said the Doctor. “Probably 
he’s taking more of the drug now.” 

“He’s much larger,” said the Very Young Man; “look 
at him!” 

The tiny figure was sitting sideways on the ring, with 
its feet hanging over the outer edge. It was growing 
perceptibly larger each instant, and in a moment it slipped 
down off the ring and sank in a heap on the handkerchief. 

“Good Heavens! Look at him!’’ cried the Big Busi¬ 
ness Man. “He's all covered with blood.” 

The little figure presented a ghastly sight. As it stead¬ 
ily grew larger they could see and recognize the Giemist’s 
haggard face, his cheek and neck stained with blood, and 
his white suit covered with dirt. 

“Look at his feet,” whispered the Big Business Man. 
They were horribly cut and bruised and greatly swollen. 

The Doctor bent over and whispered gently, “What 
can I do to help you?” The Chemist shook his head. 


After Forty-Eight -Flours 25 

His body, lying prone upon the handkerchief, had torn 
it apart in growing. When he was about twelve inches 
in length he raised his head. The Doctor bent closer. 
“Some brandy, please,” said a wraith of the Chemist’s 
voice. It was barely audible. 

“He wants some brandy,” called the Doctor. The 
Very Y oung Man looked hastily around, then opened the 
door and dashed madly out of the room. When he re¬ 
turned, the Chemist had grown to nearly four feet. He 
was sitting on the floor with his back against the Doc¬ 
tor’s knees. The Big Business Man was wiping the blood 
off his face with a damp napkin. 

“Here!” cried the Very Young Man, thrusting forth 
the brandy. The Chemist drank a little of it. Then he 
sat up, evidently somewhat revived. 

“I seem to have stopped growing,” he said. “Let’s 
finish it up now. God! how I want to be the right size 
again,” he added fervently. 

The Doctor helped him extract the vials from under his 
arm, and the Chemist touched one of the pills to his 
tongue. Then he sank back, closing his eyes. “I think 
that should be about enough,” he murmured. 

No one spoke for nearly ten minutes. Gradually the 
Chemist’s body grew, the Doctor shifting his position sev¬ 
eral times as it became larger. It seemed finally to have 
stopped growing, and was apparently nearly its former 
size. 

“Is he asleep?” whispered the Very Young Man. 

The Chemist opened his eyes. 

“No,” he answered. “I’m all right now, I think.” He 
rose to his feet, the Doctor and the Big Business Man 
supporting him on either side. 

“Sit down and tell us about it,” said the Very Young 
Man. “Did you find the girl?” 

The Chemist smiled wearily. 


26 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

“Gentlemen, I cannot talk now. Let me have a bath 
and some dinner. Then I will tell you all about it.” 

The Doctor rang for an attendant, and led the Chemist 
to the door, throwing a blanket around him as he did so. 
In the doorway the Chemist paused and looked back with 
a wan smile over the wreck of the room. 

“Give me an hour,” he said. “And eat something 
yourselves while I am gone.” Then he left, closing the 
door after him. 

When he returned, fully dressed in clothes that were 
ludicrously large for him, the room had been straightened 
up, and his four friends were finishing their meal. He 
took his place among them quietly and lighted a cigar. 

“Well, gentlemen, I suppose that you are interested to 
hear what happened to me,” he began. The Very Young 
Man asked his usual question. 

“Let him alone,” said the Doctor. “You will hear it 
all soon enough.” 

“Was it all as you expected?” asked the Banker. It 
was his first remark since the Chemist returned. 

“To a great extent, yes,” answered the Chemist. “But 
I had better tell you just what happened.” The Very 
Young Man nodded his eager agreement. 

“When I took those first four pills,” began the Chemist 
in a quiet, even tone, “my immediate .sensation was a sud¬ 
den reeling of the senses, combined with an extreme 
nausea. This latter feeling passed after a moment. 

“You will remember that I seated myself upon the floor 
and closed my eyes. When I opened them my head had 
steadied itself somewhat, but I was oppressed by a curious 
feeling of drowsiness, impossible to shake off. 

“My first mental impression was one of wonderment 
when I saw you all begin to increase in size. I remem¬ 
ber standing up beside that chair, which was then half 
again its normal size, and you”—indicating the Doctor— 


After Forty-Eight Hours 27 

“towered beside me as a giant of nine or ten feet high. 

“Steadily upward, with a curious crawling motion, 
grew the room and all its contents. Except for the feel¬ 
ing of sleep that oppressed me, I felt quite my usual 
self. No change appeared happening to me, but every¬ 
thing else seemed growing to gigantic and terrifying pro¬ 
portions. 

“Can you imagine a human being a hundred feet high? 
That is how you looked to me as I stepped upon that 
huge expanse of black silk and shouted my last good-bye 
to you! 

“Over to my left lay the ring, apparently fifteen or 
twenty feet away. I started to walk towards it, but al¬ 
though it grew rapidly larger, the distance separating 
me from it seemed to increase rather than lessen. Then 
I ran, and by the time I arrived it stood higher than my 
waist—a beautiful, shaggy, golden pit. 

“I jumped upon its rim and clung to it tightly. I could 
feel it growing beneath me, as I sat. After a moment I 
climbed upon its top surface and started to walk towards 
the point where I knew the scratch to be. 

“I found myself now, as I looked about, walking upon 
a narrow, though ever broadening, curved path. The 
ground beneath my feet appeared to be a rough, yellow¬ 
ish quartz. This path grew rougher as I advanced. Be¬ 
low the bulging edges of the path, on both sides, lay a 
shining black plain, ridged and indented, and with a sun¬ 
like sheen on the higher portions of the ridges. On the 
one hand this black plain stretched in an unbroken ex¬ 
panse to the horizon. On the other, it appeared as a 
circular valley, enclosed by a shining yellow wall. 

“The way had now become extraordinarily rough. I 
bore to the left as I advanced, keeping close to the outer 
edge. The other edge of the path I could not see. I 
clambered along hastily, and after a few moments was 


28 


The Girl in the Golden Atom 


confronted by a row of rocks and bowlders lying directly 
across my line of progress. I followed their course for 
a short distance, and finally found a space through which 
I could pass. 

“This transverse ridge was perhaps a hundred feet 
deep. Behind it and extending in a parallel direction lay 
a tremendous valley. I knew then I had reached my 
first objective. 

“I sat down upon the brink of the precipice and 
watched the cavern growing ever wider and deeper. Then 
I realized that I must begin my descent if ever I was 
to reach the bottom. For perhaps six hours I climbed 
steadily downwards. It was a fairly easy descent after 
the first little while, for the ground seemed to open up 
before me as I advanced, changing its contour so con¬ 
stantly that I was never at a loss for an easy downward 
path. 

“My feet suffered cruelly from the shaggy, metallic 
ground, and I soon had to stop and rig a sort of protec¬ 
tion for the soles of them from a portion of the harness 
over my shoulder. According to the stature I was when 
I reached the bottom, I had descended perhaps twelve 
thousand feet during this time. 

“The latter part of the journey found me nearing the 
bottom of the canon. Objects around me no longer 
seemed to increase in size, as had been constantly the 
case before, and I reasoned that probably my stature 
was remaining constant. 

“I noticed, too, as I advanced, a curious alteration in 
the form of light around me. The glare from above (the 
sky showed only as a narrow dull ribbon of blue) barely 
penetrated to the depths of the canon’s floor. But all 
about me there was a soft radiance, seeming to emanate 
from the rocks themselves. 

“The sides of the canon were shaggy and rough, be- 


After Forty-Eight Hours 29 

yond anything I had ever seen. Huge bowlders, hundreds 
of feet in diameter, were embedded in them. The bot¬ 
tom also was strewn with similar gigantic rocks. 

“I surveyed this lonely waste for some time in dismay, 
not knowing in what direction lay my goal. I knew that 
I was at the bottom of the scratch, and by the comparison 
of its size I realized I was well started on my journey. 

“I have not told you, gentlemen, that at the time I 
marked the ring I made a deeper indentation in one por¬ 
tion of the scratch and focused the microscope upon that. 
This indentation I now searched for. Luckily I found it, 
less than half a mile away—an almost circular pit, per¬ 
haps five miles in diameter, with shining walls extending 
downwards into blackness. There seemed no possible 
way of descending into it, so I sat down near its edge to 
think out my plan of action. 

“I realized now that I was faint and hungry, and 
whatever I did must be done quickly. I could turn back 
to you, or I could go on. I decided to risk the latter 
course, and took twelve more of the pills—three times 
my original dose.” 

The Chemist paused for a moment, but his auditors 
were much too intent to question him. Then he resumed 
in his former matter-of-fact tone. 

“After my vertigo had passed somewhat—it was much 
more severe this time—I looked up and found my sur¬ 
roundings growing at a far more rapid rate than before. 
I staggered to the edge of the pit. It was opening up 
and widening out at an astounding rate. Already its 
sides were becoming rough and broken, and I saw many 
places where a descent would be possible. 

“The feeling of sleep that had formerly merely op¬ 
pressed me, combined now with my physical fatigue and 
the larger dose of the drug I had taken, became almost 
intolerable. I yielded to it for a moment, lying down 



30 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

on a crag near the edge of the pit. I must have become 
almost immediately unconscious, and remained so for a 
considerable time. I can remember a horrible sensation 
of sliding headlong for what seemed like hours. I felt 
that I was sliding or falling downward. I tried to rouse 
but could not. Then came absolute oblivion. 

“When I recovered my senses I was lying partly cov¬ 
ered by a mass of smooth, shining pebbles. I was bruised 
and battered from head to foot—in a far worse condition 
than you first saw me when I returned. 

“I sat up and looked around. Beside me, sloped up¬ 
ward at an apparently increasing angle a tremendous 
glossy plane. This extended, as far as I could see, both 
to the right and left and upward into the blackness of 
the sky overhead. It was this plane that had evidently 
broken my fall, and I had been sliding down it, bring¬ 
ing with me a considerable mass of rocks and bowlders. 

“As my senses became clearer I saw I was lying on a 
fairly level floor. I could see perhaps two miles in each 
direction. Beyond that there was only darkness. The 
sky overhead was unbroken by stars or light of any kind. 
I should have been in total darkness except, as I have 
told you before, that everything, even the blackness it¬ 
self, seemed to be self-luminous. 

“The incline down which I had fallen was composed 
of some smooth substance suggesting black marble. The 
floor underfoot was quite different—more of a metallic 
quality with a curious corrugation. Before me, in the 
dim distance, I could just make out a tiny range of hills. 

“I rose, after a time, and started weakly to walk 
towards these hills. Though I was faint and dizzy from 
my fall and the lack of food, I Walked for perhaps half 
an hour, following closely the edge of the incline. No 
change in my visual surroundings occurred, except that 
I seemed gradually to be approaching the line of hills. 


After Forty-Eight Hours 31 

My situation at this time, as I turned it over in my mind, . 
appeared hopelessly desperate, and I admit I neither ex¬ 
pected to reach my destination nor to be able to return to 
my own world. 

“A sudden change in the feeling of the ground under¬ 
foot brought me to myself; I bent down and found I was 
treading on vegetation—a tiny forest extending for quite 
a distance in front and to the side of me. A few steps 
ahead a little silver ribbon threaded its way through the 
trees. This I judged to be water. 

“New hope possessed me at this discovery. I sat down 
at once and took a portion of another of the pills. 

“I must again have fallen asleep. When I aw 7 oke, 
somewhat refreshed, I found myself lying beside the huge 
trunk of a fallen tree. I was in what had evidently once 
been a deep forest, but which now was almost utterly 
desolated. Only here and there were the trees left stand¬ 
ing. For the most part they were lying in a crushed and 
tangled mass, many of them partially embedded in the 
ground. 

“I cannot express adequately to you, gentlemen, what 
an evidence of tremendous superhuman power this scene 
presented. No storm, no lightning, nor any attack of the 
elements could have produced more than a fraction of 
the destruction I saw all around me. 

“I climbed cautiously upon the fallen tree-trunk, and 
from this elevation had a much better view of my sur¬ 
roundings. I appeared to be near one end of the deso¬ 
lated area, which extended in a path about half a mile 
wide and several miles deep. In front, a thousand feet 
away, perhaps, lay the unbroken forest. 

“Descending from the tree-trunk I walked in this di¬ 
rection, reaching the edge of the woods after possibly an 
hour of the most arduous traveling of my whole journey. 

“During this time almost my only thought was the ne- 


32 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

cessity of obtaining food. I looked about me as I ad¬ 
vanced, and on one of the fallen tree-trunks I found a 
sort of vine growing. This vine bore a profusion of 
small gray berries, much like our huckleberries. They 
proved similar in taste, and I sat down and ate a quantity. 

“When I reached the edge of the forest I felt some¬ 
what stronger. I had seen up to this time no sign of 
animal life whatever. Now, as I stood silent, I could 
hear around me all the multitudinous tiny voices of the 
Woods. Insect life stirred underfoot, and in the trees 
above an occasional bird flitted to and fro. 

“Perhaps I am giving you a picture of our own world. 
I do not mean to do so. You must remember that above 
me there was no sky, just blackness. And yet so much 
light illuminated the scene that I could not believe it was 
other than what we would call daytime. Objects in the 
forest were as well lighted—better probably than they 
would be under similar circumstances in our own world. 

“The trees were of huge size compared to my present 
stature; straight, upstanding trunks, with no branches 
until very near the top. They were bluish-gray in color, 
and many of them well covered with the berry-vine I 
have mentioned. The leaves overhead seemed to be blue 
—in fact the predominating color of all the vegetation 
was blue, just as in our world it is green. The ground 
was covered with dead leaves, mould, and a sort of 
gray moss. Fungus of a similar color appeared, but 
of this I did not eat. 

“I had penetrated perhaps two miles into the forest 
when I came unexpectedly to the bank of a broad, smooth¬ 
flowing river, its silver surface seeming to radiate waves 
of the characteristic phosphorescent light. I found it 
cold, pure-tasting water, and I drank long and deeply. 
Then I remember lying down upon the mossy bank, and 
in a moment, utterly worn out, I again fell asleep.” 


CHAPTER IV 


LYLDA 

WAS awakened by the feel of soft hands upon my 
8 head and face. With a start I sat up abruptly; I 
rubbed my eyes confusedly for a moment, not knowing 
where I was. When I collected my wits I found myself 
staring into the face of a girl, who was kneeling on the 
ground before me. I recognized her at once—she was 
the girl of the microscope. 

“To say I was startled would be to put it mildly, but 
I read no fear in her expression, only wonderment at my 
springing so suddenly into life. She was dressed very 
much as I had seen her before. Her fragile beauty was 
the same, and at this closer view infinitely more appeal¬ 
ing, but I was puzzled to account for her older, more 
mature look. She seemed to have aged several years 
since the last evening I had seen her through the micro¬ 
scope. Yet, undeniably, it was the same girl. 

“For some moments we sat looking at each other in 
wonderment. Then she smiled and held out her hand, 
palm up, speaking a few words as she did so. Her voice 
was soft and musical, and the words of a peculiar quality 
that we generally describe as liquid, for want of a better 
term. What she said was wholly unintelligible, but 
whether the words were strange or the intonation differ- 
ent*from anything I had ever heard I could not determine. 

“Afterwards, during my stay in this other world, I 
found that the language of its people resembled English 
quite closely, so far as the words themselves went. But 

33 


34 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

the intonation with which they were given, and the ges¬ 
tures accompanying them, differed so widely from our 
own that they conveyed no meaning. 

“The gap separating us, however, was very much less 
than you would imagine. Strangely enough, though, it 
was not I who learned to speak her tongue, but she who 
mastered mine.” 

The Very Young Man sighed contentedly. 

“We became quite friendly after this greeting,” re¬ 
sumed the Chemist, “and it was apparent from her man¬ 
ner that she had already conceived her own idea of who 
and what I was. 

“For some time we sat and tried to communicate with 
each other. My words seemed almost as unintelligible to 
her as hers to me, except that occasionally she would di¬ 
vine my meaning, clapping her hands in childish delight. 
I made out that she lived at a considerable distance, and 
that her name was Lylda. Finally she pulled me by the 
hand and led me away with a proprietary air that amused 
and, I must admit, pleased me tremendously. 

“We had progressed through the woods in this way, 
hardly more than a few hundred yards, when suddenly I 
found that she was taking me into the mouth of a cave or 
passageway, sloping downward at an angle of perhaps 
twenty degrees. I noticed now, more graphically than 
ever before, a truth that had been gradually forcing itself 
upon me. Darkness was impossible in this new world. 
We were now shut in between narrow walls of crystalline 
rock, with a roof hardly more than fifty feet above. 

“No artificial light of any kind was in evidence, yet the 
scene was lighted quite brightly. This, I have explained, 
was caused by the phosphorescent radiation that ap¬ 
parently emanated from every particle of mineral matter 
in this universe. 

“As we advanced, many other tunnels crossed the one 


Lylda 35 

we were traveling. And now, occasionally, we passed 
other people, the men dressed similarly to Lylda, but 
wearing their hair chopped off just above the shoulder 
line. 

“Later, I found that the men were generally about five 
and a half feet in stature: lean, muscular, and with a 
grayer, harder look to their skin than the iridescent 
quality that characterized the women. 

“They were fine-looking chaps these we encountered. 
All of them stared curiously at me, and several times we 
were held up by chattering groups. The intense white¬ 
ness of my skin, for it looked in this light the color of 
chalk, seemed to both awe and amuse them. But they 
treated me with great deference and respect, which I 
afterwards learned was because of Lylda herself, and 
also what she told them about me. 

“At several of the intersections of the tunnels there 
were wide open spaces. One of these we now ap¬ 
proached. It was a vast amphitheater, so broad its op¬ 
posite wall was invisible, and it seemed crowded with 
people. At the side, on a rocky niche in the wall, a 
speaker harangued the crowd. 

“We skirted the edge of this crowd and plunged into 
another passageway, sloping downward still more steeply. 
I was so much interested in the strange scenes opening 
before me that I remarked little of the distance we 
traveled. Nor did I question Lylda but seldom. I was 
absorbed in the complete similarity between this and my 
own world in its general characteristics, and yet its com¬ 
plete strangeness in details. 

“I felt not the slightest fear. Indeed the sincerity 
and kindliness of these people seemed absolutely genuine, 
and the friendly, naive, manner of my little guide put me 
wholly at my ease. Towards me Lylda’s manner was 
one of childish delight at a new-found possession. To- 


36 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

wards those of her own people with whom we talked, 
I found she preserved a dignity they profoundly re¬ 
spected. 

“We had hardly more than entered this last tunnel 
when I heard the sound of drums and a weird sort of 
piping music, followed by shouts and cheers. Figures 
from behind us scurried past, hastening towards the 
sound. Lylda’s clasp on my hand tightened, and she 
pulled me forward eagerly. As we advanced the crowd 
became denser, pushing and shoving us about and pay¬ 
ing little attention to me. 

“In close contact with these people I soon found I was 
stronger than they, and for a time I had no difficulty in 
shoving them aside and opening a path for us. They 
took my rough handling in all good part, in fact, never 
have I met a more even-tempered, good-natured people 
than these. 

“After a time the crowd became so dense we could ad¬ 
vance no further. At this Lylda signed me :c bear to the 
side. As we approached the wall of the cavern she sud¬ 
denly clasped her hands high over her head and shouted 
something in a clear, commanding voice. Instantly the 
crowd fell back, and in a moment I found myself being 
pulled up a narrow flight of stone steps in the wall and 
out upon a level space some twenty feet above the heads 
of the people. 

“Several dignitaries occupied this platform. Lylda 
greeted them quietly, and they made place for us beside 
the parapet. I could see now that we were at the inter¬ 
section of a transverse passageway, much broader than 
the one we had been traversing. And now I received the 
greatest surprise I had had in this new world, for down 
this latter tunnel was passing a broad line of men who 
obviously were soldiers. 

“The uniformly straight lines they held; the glint of 


Lylda 37 

light on the spears they carried upright before them; the 
weird, but rhythmic, music that passed at intervals, with 
which they kept step; and, above all, the cheering en¬ 
thusiasm of the crowd, all seemed like an echo of my own 
great world above. 

“This martial ardor and what it implied came as a 
distinct shock. All I had seen before showed the gentle 
kindliness of a people whose life seemed far removed 
from the struggle for existence to which our race is sub¬ 
jected. I had come gradually to feel that this new world, 
at least, had attained the golden age of security, and that 
fear, hate, and wrongdoing had long since passed away, 
or had never been born. 

“Yet, here before my very eyes, made wholesome by the 
fires of patriotism, stalked the grim God of War. Know¬ 
ing nothing yet of the motive that inspired these people, 
I could feel no enthusiasm, but only disillusionment at 
this discovery of the omnipotence of strife. 

“For some time I must have stood in silence. Lylda, 
too, seemed to divine my thoughts, for she did not ap¬ 
plaud, but pensively watched the cheering throng below. 
All at once, with an impulsively appealing movement, she 
pulled me down towards her, and pressed her pretty cheek 
to mine. It seemed almost as if she was asking me to 
help. 

“The line of marching men seemed now to have passed, 
and the crowd surged over into the open space and began 
to disperse. As the men upon the platform with us pre¬ 
pared to leave, Lylda led me over to one of them. He 
was nearly as tall as I, and dressed in the characteristic 
tunic that seemed universally worn by both sexes. 
The upper part of his body was hung with beads, 
and across his chest was a thin, slightly convex stone 
plate. 

“After a few words of explanation from Lylda, he laid 


38 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

his hands on my shoulders near the base of the neck, 
smiling with his words of greeting. Then he held one 
hand before me, palm up, as Lylda had done, and I laid 
mine in it, which seemed the correct thing to do. 

“I repeated this performance with two others who 
joined us, and then Lylda pulled me away. We de¬ 
scended the steps and turned into the broader tunnel, 
finding near at hand a sort of sleigh, which Lylda signed 
me to enter. It was constructed evidently of wood, with 
a pile of leaves, or similar dead vegetation, for cushions. 
It was balanced upon a single runner of polished stone, 
about two feet broad, with a narrow, slightly shorter 
outrider on each side. 

“Harnessed to the shaft were two animals, more re¬ 
sembling our reindeers than anything else, except that 
they were gray in color and had no horns. An attend¬ 
ant greeted Lylda respectfully as we approached, and 
mounted a seat in front of us when we were comfortably 
settled. 

“We drove in this curious vehicle for over an hour. 
The floor of the tunnel was quite smooth, and we glided 
down its incline with little effort and at a good rate. Our 
driver preserved the balance of the sleigh by shifting his 
body from side to side so that only at rare intervals did 
the siderunners touch the ground. 

“Finally, we emerged into the open, and I found my¬ 
self viewing a scene of almost normal, earthly aspect. 
We were near the shore of a smooth, shining lake. At 
the side a broad stretch of rolling country, dotted here 
and there with trees, was visible. Near at hand, on the 
lake shore, I saw a collection of houses, most of them 
low and flat, with one much larger on a promontory 
near the lake. 

“Overhead arched a gray-blue, cloudless sky, faintly 


39 


Lylda 

star-studded, and reflected in the lake before me I saw 
that familiar gleaming trail of star-dust, hanging like a 
huge straightened rainbow overhead, and ending at my 
feet.” 


CHAPTER V 


THE WORLD IN THE RING 

T HE Chemist paused and relighted his cigar. “Per¬ 
haps you have some questions,” he suggested. 

The Doctor shifted in his chair. 

“Did you have any theory at this time”—he wanted 
to know—“about the physical conformation of this world? 
What I mean is, when you came out of this tunnel were 
you on the inside or the outside of the world?” 

“Was it the same sky you saw overhead when you 
were in the forest?” asked the Big Business Man. 

“No, ijf was what he saw in the microscope, wasn’t it?” 
said the <Very Young Man. 

“One at a time, gentlemen,” laughed the Chemist. 
“No, I had no particular theory at this time—I had too 
many other things to think of. But I do remember no¬ 
ticing one thing which gave me the clew to a fairly 
complete understanding of this universe. From it I 
formed a definite explanation, which I found was the be¬ 
lief held by the people themselves.” 

“What was that?” asked the Very Young Man. 

“I noticed, as I stood looking over this broad expanse 
of country before me, one vital thing that made it dif¬ 
ferent from any similar scene I had ever beheld. If you 
will stop and think a moment, gentlemen, you will realize 
that in our world here the horizon is caused by a curva¬ 
ture of the earth below the straight line of vision. We 
are on a convex surface. But as I gazed over this land¬ 
scape, and even with no appreciable light from the sky 

40 


The World in the Ring 41 

I could see a distance of several miles, I saw at once that 
quite the reverse was true. I seemed to be standing in 
the center of a vast shallow bowl. The ground curved 
upward into the distance. There was no distant horizon 
line, only the gradual fading into shadow of the visual 
landscape. I was standing obviously on a concave sur¬ 
face, on the inside, not the outside of the world. 

“The situation, as I now understand it, was this: Ac¬ 
cording to the smallest stature I reached, and calling my 
height at that time roughly six feet, I had descended into 
the ring at the time I met Lylda several thousand miles, 
at least. By the way, where is the ring?” 

“Here is it,” said the Very Young Man, handing it to 
him. The Chemist replaced it on his finger. “It’s pretty 
important to me now,” he said, smiling. 

“You bet!” agreed the Very Young Man. 

“You can readily understand how I descended such a 
distance, if you consider the comparative immensity of 
my stature during the first few hours I was in the ring. 
It is my understanding that this country through which 
I passed is a barren waste—merely the atoms of the 
mineral we call gold. 

“Beyond that I entered the hitherto unexplored regions 
within the atom. The country at that point where I 
found the forest, I was told later, is habitable for sev¬ 
eral hundred miles. Around it on all sides lies a desert, 
across which no one has ever penetrated. 

“This surface is the outside of the Oroid world, for so 
they call their earth. At this point the shell between the 
outer and inner surface is only a few miles in thickness. 
The two surfaces do not parallel each other here, so that 
in descending these tunnels we turned hardly more than 
an eighth of a complete circle. 

“At the city of Arite, where Lylda first took me, and 
where I had my first view of the inner surface, the curva- 


42 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

ture is slightly greater than that of our own earth, al¬ 
though, as I have said, in the opposite direction.” 

“And the space within this curvature—the heavens you 
have mentioned—how great do you estimate it to be?” 
asked the Doctor. 

“Based on the curvature at Arite it would be about six 
thousand miles in diameter.” 

“Bias this entire inner surface been explored?” asked 
the Big Business Man. 

“No, only a small portion. The Oroids are not an ad¬ 
venturous people. There are only two nations, less than 
twelve million people all together, on a surface nearly as 
extensive as our own.” 

“How about those stars?” suggested the Very Young 
Man. 

“I believe they comprise a complete universe similar 
to our own solar system. There is a central sun-star, 
around which many of the others revolve. You must 
understand, though, that these other worlds are infinitely 
tiny compared to the Oroids, and, if inhabited, support 
beings nearly as much smaller than the Oroids, as they 
are smaller than you.” 

“Great Caesar!” ejaculated the Banker. “Don’t let’s go 
into that any deeper!” 

“Tell us more about Lylda,” prompted the Very Young 
Man. 

“You are insatiable on that point,” laughed the Chem¬ 
ist. “Well, when we left the sleigh, Lylda took me 
directly into the city of Arite. I found it an orderly col¬ 
lection of low houses, seemingly built of uniformly cut, 
highly polished gray blocks. As we passed through the 
streets, some of which were paved with similar blocks, 
I was reminded of nothing so much as the old jingles 
of Spotless Town. Everything was immaculately, inor¬ 
dinately clean. Indeed, the whole city seemed built of 


The World in the Ring 43 

some curious form of opaque glass, newly scrubbed an<J 
polished. 

‘‘Children crowded from the doorways as we advanced, 
but Lylda dispersed them with a gentle though firm, 
command. As we approached the sort of castle I have 
mentioned, the reason for Lylda’s authoritative manner 
dawned upon me. She was, I soon learned, daughter of 
one of the most learned men of the nation and was— 
handmaiden, do you call it ?—to the queen.” 

“So it was a monarchy?” interrupted the Big Business 
Man. “I should never have thought that.” 

“Lylda called their leader a king. In reality he was 
the president, chosen by the people, for a period of about 
what we would term twenty years; I learned something 
about this republic during my stay, but not as much as 
I would have liked. Politics was not Lylda’s strong 
point, and I had to get it all from her, you know. 

“For several days I was housed royally in the castle. 
Food was served me by an attendant who evidently was 
assigned solely to look after my needs. At first I was 
terribly confused by the constant, uniform light, but when 
I found certain hours set aside for sleep, just as we 
have them, when I began to eat regularly, I soon fell into 
the routine of this new life. 

“The food was not greatly different from our own, al¬ 
though I found not a single article I could identify. It 
consisted principally of vegetables and fruits, the latter 
of an apparently inexhaustible variety. 

“Lylda visited me at intervals, and I learned I was 
awaiting an audience with the king. During these days 
she made rapid progress with my language—so rapid that 
I shortly gave up the idea of mastering hers. 

“And now, with the growing intimacy between us and 
our ability to communicate more readily, I learned the 
simple, tragic story of her race—new details, of course, 


44 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

but the old, old tale of might against right, and the 
tragedy of a trusting, kindly people, blindly thinking 
others as just as themselves. 

“For thousands of years, since the master life-giver had 
come from one of the stars to populate the world, the 
Oroid nation had dwelt in peace and security. These peo¬ 
ple cared nothing for adventure. No restless thirst for 
knowledge led them to explore deeply the limitless land 
surrounding them. Even from the earliest times no 
struggle for existence, no doctrine of the survival of the 
fittest, hung over them as with us. No wild animals 
harassed them; no savages menaced them. A fertile 
boundless land, a perfect climate, nurtured them tenderly. 

“Under such conditions they developed only the softer, 
gentler qualities of nature. Many laws among them were 
unnecessary, for life was so simple, so pleasant to live, 
and the attainment of all the commonly accepted stand¬ 
ards of wealth so easy, that the incentive to wrongdoing 
was almost non-existent. 

“Strangely enough, and fortunately, too, no individuals 
rose among them with the desire for power. Those in 
command were respected and loved as true workers for 
the people, and they accepted their authority in the same 
spirit with which it was given. Indolence, in its highest 
sense the wonderful art of doing nothing gracefully, 
played the greatest part in their life. 

“Then, after centuries of ease and peaceful security, 
came the awakening. Almost without warning another 
nation had come out of the unknown to attack them. 

“With the hurt feeling that comes to a child unjustly 
treated, they all but succumbed to this first onslaught. 
The abduction of numbers of their women, for such 
seemed the principal purpose of the invaders, aroused 
them sufficiently to repel this first crude attack. Their 
manhood challenged, their anger as a nation awakened 


The World in the Ring 45 

for the first time, they sprang as one man into the horror 
we call war. 

“With the defeat of the Malites came another period of 
ease and security. They had learned no lesson, but went 
their indolent way, playing through life like the kindly 
children they were. During this last period some inter¬ 
course between them and the Malites took place. The 
latter people, whose origin was probably nearly opposite 
them on the inner surface, had by degrees pushed their 
frontiers closer and closer to the Oroids. Trade between 
the two was carried on to some extent, but the character 
of the Malites, their instinctive desire for power, for its 
own sake, their consideration for themselves as superior 
beings, caused them to be distrusted and feared by their 
more simple-minded companion nation. 

“You can almost guess the rest, gentlemen. Lylda told 
me little about the Malites, but the loathing disgust of her 
manner, her hesitancy, even to bring herself to mention 
them, spoke more eloquently than words. 

“Four years ago, as they measure time, came the second 
attack, and now, in a huge arc, only a few hundred miles 
from Arite, hung the opposing armies.” 

The Chemist paused. “That’s the condition I found, 
gentlemen,” he said. “Not a strikingly original or un¬ 
familiar situation, was it?” 

“By Jove!” remarked the Doctor thoughtfully, “what 
a curious thing that the environment of our earth should 
so affect that world inside the ring. It does make you 
stop and think, doesn’t it, to realize how those infinitesi¬ 
mal creatures are actuated now by the identical motives 
that inspire us?” 

“Yet it does seem very reasonable, I should say,” the 
Big Business Man put in. 

“Let’s have another round of drinks,” suggested the 
Banker—“this is dry work!” 


The Girl in the Golden Atom 


46 

"As a scientist you’d make a magnificent plumber, 
George!” retorted the Big Business Man. "You're about 
as helpful in this little gathering as an oyster!” 

The Very Young Man rang for a waiter. 

"I’ve been thinking-” began the Banker, and 

stopped at the smile of his companion. "Shut up!”—he 
finished—"that’s cheap wit, you know!" 

"Go on, George,” encouraged the other, "you've been 
thinking-” 

"I’ve been tremendously interested in this extraordinary 
story”—he addressed himself to the Chemist—"but there’s 
one point I don’t get at all. Ho\v many days were you in 
that ring do you make out?” 

"I believe about seven, all told,” returned the Chemist. 

"But you were only away from us some forty hours. 
I ought to know, I’ve been right here.” He looked at 
his crumpled clothes somewhat ruefully. 

"The change of time-progress was one of the surprises 
of my adventure,” said the Chemist. "It is easily ex¬ 
plained in a general way, although I cannot even attempt 
a scientific theory of its cause. But I must confess that 
before I started the possibility of such a thing never even 
occurred to me.” 

"To get a conception of this change you must analyze 
definitely what time is. We measure and mark it by 
years, months, and so forth, down to minutes and sec¬ 
onds, all based upon the movements of our earth around 
its sun. But that is the measurement of time, not time 
itself. How would you describe time?” 

The Big Business Man smiled. "Time,” he said, "is 
what keeps everything from happening at once.” 

"Very clever,” laughed the Chemist. 

The Doctor leaned forward earnestly. "I should say,” 
he began, "that time is the rate at which we live—the 
speed at which we successively pass through our existence 




The World in the Ring 47 

from birth to death. It’s very hard to put intelligibly, 
but I think I know what I mean,” he finished somewhat 
lamely. 

“Exactly so. Time is a rate of life-progress, differ¬ 
ent for every individual, and only made standard because 
we take the time-duration of the earth’s revolution around 
the sun, which is constant, and arbitrarily say: ‘That is 
thirty-one million five hundred thousand odd seconds.’ ” 

“Is time different for every individual?” asked the 
Banker argumentatively. 

“Think a moment,” returned the Chemist. “Suppose 
your brain were to work twice as fast as mine. Suppose 
your heart beat twice as fast, and all the functions of your 
body were accelerated in a like manner. What we call a 
second would certainly seem to you twice as long. Fur¬ 
ther than that, it actually would be twice as long, so far 
as you were concerned. Your digestion, instead of tak¬ 
ing perhaps four hours, would take two. You would eat 
twice as often. The desire for sleep would overtake you 
every twelve hours instead of twenty-four, and you would 
be satisfied with four hours of unconsciousness instead of 
eight. In short, you would soon be living a cycle of two 
days every twenty-four hours. Time then, as we meas¬ 
ure it, for you at least would have doubled—you would 
be progressing through life at twice the rate that I am 
through mine.” 

“That may be theoretically true,” the Big Business Man 
put in. “Practically, though, it has never happened to 
any one.” 

“Of course not, to such a great degree as the instance I 
put. No one, except in disease, has ever doubled our 
average rate of life-progress, and lived it out as a bal¬ 
anced, otherwise normal existence. But there is no ques¬ 
tion that to some much smaller degree we all of us differ 
one from the other. The difference, however, is so com- 


48 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

paratively slight, that we can each one reconcile it to the 
standard measurement of time. And so, outwardly, time 
is the same for all of us. But inwardly, why, we none of 
us conceive a minute or an hour to be the same! How 
do you know how long a minute is to me? More than 
that, time is not constant even in the same individual. 
How many hours are shorter to you than others ? How 
many days have been almost interminable? No, instead 
of being constant, there is nothing more inconstant than 
time.” 

“Haven’t you confused two different issues?” suggested 
the Big Business Man. “Granted what you say about 
the slightly different rate at which different individuals 
live, isn’t it quite another thing, how long time seems to 
you. A day when you have nothing to do seems long, or, 
on the other hand, if you are very busy it seems short. 
But mind, it only seems short or long, according to the 
preoccupation of your mind. That has nothing to do 
with the speed of your progress through life.” 

“Ah, but I think it has,” cried the Chemist. “You for¬ 
get that we none of us have all of the one thing to the 
exclusion of the other. Time seems short; it seems long, 
and in the end it all averages up, and makes our rate of 
progress what it is. Now if any of us were to go through 
life in a calm, deliberate way, making time seem as long 
as possible, he would live more years, as we measure 
them, than if he rushed headlong through the days, ac¬ 
complishing always as much as possible. I mean in 
neither case to go to the extremes, but only so far as 
would be consistent with the maintenance of a normal 
standard of health. How about it?” He turned to the 
Doctor. “You ought to have an opinion on that.” 

“I rather think you are right,” said the latter thought¬ 
fully, “although I doubt very much if the man who took 
it easy would do as much during his longer life as the 


The World in the Ring 49 

other with his energy would accomplish in the lesser time 
allotted to him.” 

“Probably he wouldn’t,” smiled the Chemist; “but that 
does not alter the point we are discussing.” 

“How does this apply to the world in the ring?” ven¬ 
tured the Very Young Man. 

“I believe there is a very close relationship between the 
dimensions of length, breadth, and thickness, and time. 
Just what connection with them it has, I have no idea. 
Yet, when size changes, time-rate changes; you have only 
to look at our own universe to discover that.” 

“How do you mean?” asked the Very Young Man. 

“Why, all life on our earth, in a general way, illustrates 
the fundamental fact that the larger a thing is, the slower 
its time-progress is. An elephant, for example, lives more 
years than we humans. Yet how quickly a fly is born, 
matured, and aged! There are exceptions, of course; 
but in a majority of cases it is true. 

“So I believe that as I diminished in stature, my time- 
progress became faster and faster. I am seven days 
older than when I left you day before yesterday. I have 
lived those seven days, gentlemen, there is no getting 
around that fact.” 

“This is all tremendously interesting,” sighed the Big 
Business Man; “but not very comprehensible.” 


CHAPTER VI 


STRATEGY AND KISSES 

“TT was the morning of my third day in the castle,” 
]|_ began the Chemist again, “that I was taken by 
Lylda before the king. We found him seated alone in a 
little anteroom, overlooking a large courtyard, which we 
could see was crowded with an expectant, waiting throng. 
I must explain to you now, that I was considered by 
Lylda somewhat in the light of a Messiah, come to save 
her nation from the destruction that threatened it. 

“She believed me a supernatural being, which, indeed, if 
you come to think of it, gentlemen, is exactly what I 
was. I tried to tell her something of myself and the 
world I had come from, but the difficulties of language 
and her smiling insistence and faith in her own concep¬ 
tion of me, soon caused me to desist. Thereafter I let 
her have her own way, and did not attempt any explana¬ 
tion again for some time. 

“For several weeks before Lylda found me sleeping by 
the river’s edge, she had made almost a daily pilgrimage 
to that vicinity. A maidenly premonition, a feeling that 
had first come to her several years before, told her of my 
coming, and her father’s knowledge and scientific beliefs 
had led her to the outer surface of the world as the direc¬ 
tion in which to look. A curious circumstance, gentle¬ 
men, lies in the fact that Lylda clearly remembered the oc¬ 
casion when this first premonition came to her. And in 
the telling, she described graphically the scene in the cave, 
where I saw her through the microscope.” The Chemist 
paused an instant and then resumed. 

50 


Strategy and Kisses 51 

0 

“When we entered the presence of the king, he greeted 
me quietly, and made me sit by his side, while Lylda knelt 
on the floor at our feet. The king impressed me as a 
man about fifty years of age. He was smooth-shaven, 
with black, wavy hair, reaching his shoulders. He was 
dressed in the usual tunic, the upper part of his body 
covered by a quite similar garment, ornamented with a 
variety of metal objects. His feet were protected with a 
sort of buskin; at his side hung a crude-looking metal 
spear. 

“The conversation that followed my entrance, lasted 
perhaps fifteen minutes. Lylda interpreted for us as well 
as she could, though I must confess we were all three at 
times completely at a loss. But Lylda’s bright, intelligent 
little face, and the resourcefulness of her gestures, always 
managed somehow to convey her meaning. The charm 
and grace of her manner, all during the talk, her win¬ 
someness, and the almost spiritual kindness and tenderness 
that characterized her, made me feel that she embodied 
all those qualities with which we of this earth idealize our 
own womanhood. 

“I found myself falling steadily under the spell of her 
beauty, until—well, gentlemen, it's childish for me to en¬ 
large upon this side of my adventure, you know; but— 
Lylda means everything to me now, and I’m going back 
for her just as soon as I possibly can." 

“Bully for you!" cried the Very Young Man. “Why 
didn’t you bring her with you this time?" 

“Let him tell it his own way," remonstrated the Doctor. 
The Very Young Man subsided with a sigh. 

“During our talk," resumed the Chemist, “I learned 
from the king that Lylda had promised him my assistance 
in overcoming the enemies that threatened his country. 
He smilingly told me that our charming little interpreter 
had assured him I would be able to do this. Lylda’s 


The Girl in the Golden Atom 


52 

blushing face, as she conveyed this meaning to me, was so 
thoroughly captivating, that before I knew it, and quite 
without meaning to, I pulled her up towards me and 
kissed her. 

“The king was more surprised by far than Lylda, at 
this extraordinary behavior. Obviously neither of them 
had understood what a kiss meant, although Lylda, by her 
manner evidently comprehended pretty thoroughly. 

“I told them then, as simply as possible to enable Lylda 
to get my meaning, that I could, and would gladly aid in 
their war. I explained then, that I had the power to 
change my stature, and could make myself grow very 
large or very small in a short space of time. 

“This, as Lylda evidently told it to him, seemed quite 
beyond the king’s understanding. He comprehended 
finally, or at least he agreed to believe my statement. 

“This led to the consideration of practical questions of 
how I was to proceed in their war. I had not considered 
any details before, but now they appeared of the utmost 
simplicity. All I had to do was to make myself a hun¬ 
dred or two hundred feet high, walk out to the battle¬ 
lines, and scatter the opposing army like a set of small 
boys’ playthings.” 

“What a quaint idea!” said the Banker. “A modern 
‘Gulliver.’ ” 

The Chemist did not heed this interruption. 

“Then like three children we plunged into a discussion 
of exactly how I was to perform these wonders, the king 
laughing heartily as we pictured the attack on my tiny 
enemies. 

“He then asked me how I expected to accomplish this 
change of size, and I very briefly told him of our larger 
world, and the manner in which I had come from it into 
his. Then I showed the drugs that I still carried care¬ 
fully strapped to me. This seemed definitely to convince 


Strategy and Kisses 53 

the king of my sincerity. He rose abruptly to his feet, 
and strode through a doorway on to a small balcony 
overlooking the courtyard below. 

“As he stepped out into the view of the people, a great 
cheer arose. He waited quietly for them to stop, and 
then raised his hand and began speaking. Lylda and I 
stood hand in hand in the shadow of the doorway, out of 
sight of the crowd, but with it and the entire courtyard 
plainly in our view. 

“It was a quadrangular enclosure, formed by the four 
sides of the palace, perhaps three hundred feet across, 
packed solidly now with people of both sexes, the gleam¬ 
ing whiteness of the upper parts of their bodies, and their 
upturned faces, making a striking picture. 

“For perhaps ten minutes the king spoke steadily, save 
when he was interrupted by applause. Then he stopped 
abruptly and, turning, pulled Lylda and me out upon the 
balcony. The enthusiasm of the crowd doubled at our 
appearance. I was pushed forward to the balcony rail, 
where I bowed to the cheering throng. 

“Just after I left the king’s balcony, I met Lylda’s fa¬ 
ther. He was a kindly-faced old gentleman, and took a 
great interest in me and my story. He it was who told 
me about the physical conformation of his world, and he 
seemed to comprehend my explanation of mine. 

“That night it rained—a heavy, torrential downpour, 
such as we have in the tropics. Lylda and I had been 
talking for some time, and, I must confess, I had been 
making love to her ardently. I broached now the prin¬ 
cipal object of my entrance into her world, and, with an 
eloquence I did not believe I possessed, I pictured the 
wonders of our own great earth above, begging her to 
come back with me and live out her life with mine. 

“Much of what I said, she probably did not under¬ 
stand, but the main facts were intelligible without ques- 


54 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

tion. She listened quietly. When I had finished, and 
waited for her decision, she reached slowly out and 
clutched my shoulders, awkwardly making as if to kiss 
me. In an instant she was in my arms, with a low, happy 
little cry. 


CHAPTER VII 


A MODERN GULLIVER 

clattering fall of rain brought us to our- 
JL selves. Rising to her feet, Lylda pulled me 
over to the window-opening, and together we stood and 
looked out into the night. The scene before us was 
beautiful, with a weirdness almost impossible to describe. 
It was as bright as I had ever seen this world, for even 
though heavy clouds hung overhead, the light from the 
stars was never more than a negligible quantity. 

“We were facing the lake—a shining expanse of silver 
radiation, its surface shifting and crawling, as though a 
great undulating blanket of silver mist lay upon it. And 
coming down to meet it from the sky were innumerable 
lines of silver—a vast curtain of silver cords that broke 
apart into great strings of pearls when I followed their 
downward course. 

“And then, as I turned to Lylda, I was struck with the 
extraordinary weirdness of her beauty as never before. 
The reflected light from the rain had something the qual¬ 
ity of our moonlight. Shining on Lylda’s body, it tre¬ 
mendously enhanced the iridescence of her skin. And her 
face, upturned to mine, bore an expression of radiant 
happiness and peace such as I had never seen before on a 
woman’s countenance.” 

The Chemist paused, his voice dying away into silence 
as he sat lost in thought. Then he pulled himself to¬ 
gether with a start. “It was a sight, gentlemen, the 
memory of which I shall cherish all my life. 

55 


56 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

“The next day was that set for my entrance into the 
war. Lylda and I had talked nearly all night, and had 
decided that she was to return with me to my world. By 
morning the rain had stopped, and we sat together in the 
window-opening, silenced with the thrill of the wonderful 
new joy that had come into our hearts. 

“The country before us, under the cloudless, starry sky, 
stretched gray-blue and beautiful into the quivering ob¬ 
scurity of the distance. At our feet lay the city, just 
awakening into life. Beyond, over the rolling meadows 
and fields, wound the road that led out to the battle-front, 
and coming back over it now, we could see an endless line 
of vehicles. These, as they passed through the street be¬ 
neath our window, I found were loaded with soldiers, 
wounded and dying. I shuddered at the sight of one 
cart in particular, and Lylda pressed close to me, plead¬ 
ing with her eyes for my help for her stricken people. 

“My exit from the castle was made quite a ceremony. 
A band of music and a guard of several hundred soldiers 
ushered me forth, walking beside the king, with Lylda a 
few paces behind. As we passed through the streets of 
the city, heading for the open country beyond, we were 
cheered continually by the people who thronged the streets 
and crowded upon the housetops to watch us pass. 

“Outside Arite I was taken perhaps a mile, where a 
wide stretch of country gave me the necessary space for 
my growth. We were standing upon a slight hill, below 
which, in a vast semicircle, fully a hundred thousand peo¬ 
ple were watching. 

“And now, for the first time, fear overcame me. I 
realized my situation—saw myself in a detached sort of 
way—a stranger in this extraordinary world, and only the 
power of my drug to raise me out of it. This drug you 
must remember, I had not as yet taken. Suppose it were 
not to act ? Or were to act wrongly ? 


A Modern Gulliver 


57 

“I glanced around. The king stood before me, quietly 
waiting my pleasure. Then I turned to Lylda. One 
glance at her proud, happy little face, and my fear left 
me as suddenly as it had come. I took her in my arms 
and kissed her, there before that multitude. Then I set 
her down, and signified to the king I was ready. 

“I took a minute quantity of one of the drugs, and as I 
had done before, sat down with my eyes covered. My 
sensations were fairly similar to those I have already 
described. When I looked up after a moment, I found 
the landscape dwindling to tiny proportions in quite as 
astonishing a way as it had grown before. The king and 
Lylda stood now hardly above my ankle. 

“A great cry arose from the people—a cry wherein 
horror, fear, and applause seemed equally mixed. I 
looked down and saw thousands of them running away 
in terror. 

“Still smaller grew everything within my vision, and 
then, after a moment, the landscape seemed at rest. I 
kneeled now upon the ground, carefully, to avoid tread¬ 
ing on any of the people around me. I located Lylda and 
the king after a moment; tiny little creatures less than an 
inch in height. I was then, I estimated, from their view¬ 
point, about four hundred feet tall. 

“I put my hand flat upon the ground near Lylda, and 
after a moment she climbed into it, two soldiers lifting 
her up the side of my thumb as it lay upon the ground. 
In the hollow of my palm, she lay quite securely, and very 
carefully I raised her up towards my face. Then, seeing 
that she was frightened, I set her down again. 

“At my feet, hardly more than a few steps away, lay 
the tiny city of Arite and the lake. I could see all around 
the latter now, and could make out clearly a line of hills 
on the other side. Off to the left the road wound up 
out of sight in the distance. As far as I could see, a line 


58 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

of soldiers was passing out along this road—marching 
four abreast, with carts at intervals, loaded evidently with 
supplies; only occasionally, now, vehicles passed in the 
other direction. Can I make it plain to you, gentlemen, 
my sensations in changing stature? I felt at first as 
though I were tremendously high in the air, looking down 
as from a balloon upon the familiar territory beneath me. 
That feeling passed after a few moments, and I found 
that my point of view had changed. I no longer felt that 
I was looking down from a balloon, but felt as a normal 
person feels. And again I conceived myself but six feet 
tall, standing above a dainty little toy world. It is all 
in the viewpoint, of course, and never, during all my 
changes, was I for more than a moment able to feel of a 
different stature than I am at this present instant. It 
was always everything else that changed. 

“According to the directions I had received from the 
king, I started now to follow the course of the road. I 
found it difficult walking, for the country was dotted with 
houses, trees, and cultivated fields, and each footstep was 
a separate problem. 

“I progressed in this manner perhaps two miles, cover¬ 
ing what the day before I would have called about a hun¬ 
dred and thirty or forty miles. The country became 
wilder as I advanced, and now was in places crowded with 
separate collections of troops. 

“I have not mentioned the commotion I made in this 
walk over the country. My coming must have been told 
widely by couriers the night before, to soldiers and peas¬ 
antry alike, or the sight of me would have caused utter 
demoralization. As it was, I must have been terrifying 
to a tremendous degree. I think the careful way in which 
I picked my course, stepping in the open as much as pos¬ 
sible, helped to reassure the people. Behind me, when¬ 
ever I turned, they seemed rather more curious than fear- 


A Modern Gulliver 


59 

ful, and once or twice when I stopped for a few moments 
they approached my feet closely. One athletic young 
soldier caught the loose end of the string of one of my 
buskins, as it hung over my instep close to the ground and 
pulled himself up hand over hand, amid the enthusiastic 
cheers of his comrades. 

“I had walked nearly another mile, when almost in 
front of me, and perhaps a hundred yards away, I saw a 
remarkable sight that I did not at first understand. The 
country here was crossed by a winding river running in a 
general way at right angles to my line of progress. At 
the right, near at hand, and on the nearer bank of the 
river, lay a little city, perhaps half the size of Arite, with 
its back up against a hill. 

“What first attracted my attention was that from a 
dark patch across the river which seemed to be woods, 
pebbles appeared to pop up at intervals, traversing a little 
arc perhaps as high as my knees, and falling into the 
city. I watched for a moment and then I understood. 
There was a siege in progress, and the catapults of the 
Malites were bombarding the city with rocks. 

“I went up a few steps closer, and the pebbles stopped 
coming. I stood now beside the city, and as I bent over 
it, I could see by the battered houses the havoc the bom¬ 
bardment had caused. Inert little figures lay in the 
streets, and I bent lower and inserted my thumb and fore¬ 
finger between a row of houses and picked one up. It was 
the body of a woman, partly mashed. I set it down again 
hastily. 

“Then as I stood up, I felt a sting on my leg. A peb¬ 
ble had hit me on the shin and dropped at my feet. I 
picked it up. It was the size of a small walnut—a huge 
bowlder six feet or more in diameter it would have been in 
Lylda’s eyes. At the thought of her I was struck with 
a sudden fit of anger. I flung the pebble violently down 


60 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

into the wooded patch and leaped over the river in one 
bound, landing squarely on both feet in the woods. It 
was like jumping into a patch of ferns. 

“I stamped about me for a moment until a large part 
of the woods was crushed down. Then I bent over and 
poked around with my finger. Underneath the tangled 
wreckage of tiny-tree trunks, lay numbers of the Malites. 
I must have trodden upon a thousand or more, as one 
would stamp upon insects. 

“The sight sickened me at first, for after all, I could 
not look upon them as other than men, even though they 
were only the length of my thumb-nail. I walked a few 
steps forward, and in all directions I could see swarms of 
the little creatures running. Then the memory of my 
coming departure from this world with Lylda, and my 
promise to the king to rid his land once for all from these 
people, made me feel again that they, like vermin, w T ere to 
be destroyed. 

“Without looking directly down, I spent the next two 
hours stamping over this entire vicinity. Then I ran two 
or three miles directly toward the country of the Malites, 
and returning I stamped along the course of the river for 
a mile or so in both directions. Then I walked back to 
Arite, again picking my way carefully among crowds of 
Oroids, who now feared me so little that I had difficulty 
in moving without stepping upon them. 

“When I had regained my former size, which needed 
two successive doses of the drug, I found myself sur¬ 
rounded by a crowd of the Oroids, pushing and shoving 
each other in an effort to get closer to me. The news of 
my success over their enemy have been divined by them, 
evidently. Lord knows it must have been obvious enough 
what I was going to do, when they saw me stride away, a 
being four hundred feet tall. 

“Their enthusiasm and thankfulness now were so 


A Modern Gulliver 


61 


mixed with awe and reverent worship of me as a divine 
being, that when I advanced towards Arite they opened a 
path immediately. The king, accompanied by Lylda, met 
me at the edge of the city. The latter threw herself into 
my arms at once, crying with relief to find me the proper 
size once more. 

“I need not go into details of the ceremonies of rejoic¬ 
ing that took place this afternoon. These people seemed 
little given to pomp and public demonstration. The king 
made a speech from his balcony, telling them all I had 
done, and the city was given over to festivities and prep¬ 
arations to receive the returning soldiers.” 

The Chemist pushed his chair back from the table, and 
moistened his dry lips with a swallow of water. “I tell 
you, gentlemen,” he continued, “I felt pretty happy that 
day. It’s a wonderful feeling to find yourself the sa¬ 
vior of a nation.” 

At that the Doctor jumped to his feet, overturning his 
chair, and striking the table a blow with his fist that made 
the glasses dance. 

“By God!” he fairly shouted, “that's just what you can 
be here to us.” 

The Banker looked startled, while the Very Young 
Man pulled the Chemist by the coat in his eagerness to be 
heard. “A few of those pills,” he said in a voice that 
quivered with excitement, “when you are standing in 
France, and you can walk over to Berlin and kick the 
houses apart with the toe of your boot.” 

“Why not?” said the Big Business Man, and silence 
fell on the group as they stared at each other, awed by 
the possibilities that opened up before them. 


CHAPTER VIII 


“l MUST GO BACK” 

T HE tremendous plan for the salvation of their own 
suffering world through the Chemist’s discovery 
occupied the five friends for some time. Then laying 
aside this subject, that now had become of the most vital 
importance to them all, the Chemist resumed his narrative. 

“My last evening in the world of the ring, I spent with 
Lylda, discussing our future, and making plans for the 
journey. I must tell you now, gentlemen, that never for 
a moment during my stay in Arite was I once free from 
an awful dread of this return trip. I tried to conceive 
what it would be like, and the more I thought about it, 
the more hazardous it seemed. 

“You must realize, when I was growing smaller, com¬ 
ing in, I was able to climb down, or fall or slide down, 
into the spaces as they opened up. Going back, I could 
only imagine the world as closing in upon me, crushing 
me to death unless I could find a larger space immediately 
above into which I could climb. 

“And as I talked with Lylda about this and tried to 
make her understand what I hardly understood myself, I 
gradually was brought to realize the full gravity of the 
danger confronting us. If only I had made the trip out 
once before, I could have ventured it with her. But as I 
looked at her fragile little body, to expose it to the ter¬ 
rible possibilities of such a journey was unthinkable. 
“There was another question, too, that troubled me. I 

had been gone from you nearly a week, and you were 

62 


“I Must Go Back” 


63 

only to wait for me two days. I believed firmly that I 
was living at a faster rate, and that probably my time with 
you had not expired. But I did not know. And sup¬ 
pose, when I had come out on to the surface of the ring, 
one of you had had it on his finger walking along the 
street? No, I did not want Lylda with me in that event. 

“And so I told her—made her understand—that she 
must stay behind, and that I would come back for her. 
She did not protest. She said nothing—just looked up 
into my face with wide, staring eyes and a little quiver of 
her lips. Then she clutched my hand and fell into a low, 
sobbing cry. 

“I held her in my arms for a few moments, so little, so 
delicate, so human in her sorrow, and yet almost super¬ 
human in her radiant beauty. Soon she stopped crying 
and smiled up at me bravely. 

“Next morning I left. Lylda took me through the 
tunnels and back into the forest by the river’s edge where 
I had first met her. There we parted. I can see, now, 
her pathetic, drooping little figure as she trudged back to 
the tunnel. 

“When she had disappeared, I sat down to plan out my 
journey. I resolved now to reverse as nearly as possible 
the steps I had taken coming in. Acting on this decision, 
I started back to that portion of the forest where I had 
trampled it down. 

“I found the place without difficulty, stopping once on 
the way to eat a few berries, and some of the food I 
carried with me. Then I took a small amount of one of 
the drugs, and in a few moments the forest trees had 
.dwindled into tiny twigs beneath my feet. 

“I started now to find the huge incline down which I 
had fallen, and when I reached it, after some hours of 
wandering, I followed its bottom edge to where a pile of 
rocks and dirt marked my former landing-place. The 


64 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

rocks were much larger than I remembered them, and so 
I knew I was not so large, now, as when I was here be¬ 
fore. 

“Remembering the amount of the drug I had taken 
coming down, I took now' twelve of the pills. Then, in a 
sudden panic, I hastily took two of the others. The re¬ 
sult made my head swim most horribly. I sat or lay 
down, I forget which. When I looked up I saw the hills 
beyond the river and forest coming towards me, yet 
dwindling away beneath my feet as they approached. 
The incline seemed folding up upon itself, like a telescope. 
As I watched, its upper edge came into view, a curved, 
luminous line against the blackness above. Every in¬ 
stant it crawled down closer, more sharply curved, and its 
inclined surface grew steeper. 

“All this time, as I stood still, the ground beneath my 
feet seemed to be moving. It was crawling towards me, 
and folding up underneath where I was standing. Fre¬ 
quently I had to move to avoid rocks that came at me 
and passed under my feet into nothingness. 

“Then, all at once, I realized that I had been stepping 
constantly backward, to avoid the inclined wall as it 
shoved itself towards me. I turned to see what was be¬ 
hind, and horror made my flesh creep at what I saw. A 
black, forbidding wall, much like the incline in front, en¬ 
tirely encircled me. It was hardly more than half a mile 
away, and towered four or five thousand feet overhead. 

“And as I stared in terror, I could see it closing in, the 
line of its upper edge coming steadily closer and lower. 
I looked wildly around with an overpowering impulse to 
run. In every direction towered this rocky wall, inex¬ 
orably swaying in to crush me. 

“I think I fainted. When I came to myself the scene 
had not greatly changed. I was lying at the bottom and 


“I Must Go Back” 


65 

against one wall of a circular pit, now about a thousand 
feet in diameter and nearly twice as deep. The wall all 
around I could see was almost perpendicular, and it 
seemed impossible to ascend its smooth, shining sides. 
The action of the drug had evidently worn off, for every¬ 
thing was quite still. 

“My fear had now left me, for I remembered this cir¬ 
cular pit quite well. I walked over to its center, and look¬ 
ing around and up to its top I estimated distances care¬ 
fully. Then I took two more of the pills. 

“Immediately the familiar, sickening, crawling sensa¬ 
tion began again. As the walls closed in upon me, I kept 
carefully in the center of the pit. Steadily they crept in. 
Now only a few hundred feet away! Now only a few 
paces—and then I reached out and touched both sides at 
once with my hands. 

“I tell you, gentlemen, it was a terrifying sensation to 
stand in that well (as it now seemed), and feel its walls 
closing up with irresistible force. But now the upper 
edge was within reach of my fingers. I leaped upward 
and hung for a moment, then pulled myself up and scrab¬ 
bled out, tumbling in a heap on the ground above. As I 
recovered myself, I looked again at the hole out of which 
I had escaped; it was hardly big enough to contain my 
fist. 

“I knew, now, I was at the bottom of the scratch. But 
how different it looked than before. It seemed this time 
a long, narrow canon, hardly more than sixty feet across. 
I glanced up and saw the blue sky overhead, flooded with 
light, that I knew was the space of this room above the 
ting. 

“The problem now was quite a different one than get¬ 
ting out of the pit, for I saw that the scratch was so deep 
in proportion to its width that if I let myself get too big, 


66 


The Girl in the Golden Atom 


I would be crushed by its walls before I could jump out. 
It would be necessary, therefore, to stay comparatively 
small and climb up its side. 

“I selected what appeared to be an especially rough sec¬ 
tion, and took a portion of another of the pills. Then I 
started to climb. After an hour the buskins on my feet 
were torn to fragments, and I was bruised and battered 
as you saw me. I see, now, how I could have made both 
the descent into the ring, and my journey back with com¬ 
paratively little effort, but I did the best I knew at the 
time. 

“When the canon was about ten feet in width, and I 
had been climbing arduously for several hours, I found 
myself hardly more than fifteen or twenty feet above its 
bottom. And I was still almost that far from the top. 
With the stature I had then attained, I could have climbed 
the remaining distance easily, but for the fact that the 
wall above had grown too smooth to afford a foothold. 
The effects of the drug had again worn off, and I sat 
down and prepared to take another dose. I did so—the 
smallest amount I could—and held ready in my hand a 
pill of the other kind in case of emergency. Steadily the 
walls closed in. 

“A terrible feeling of dizziness now came over me. I 
clutched the rock beside which I was sitting, and it seemed 
to melt like ice beneath my grasp. Then I remembered 
seeing the edge of the canon within reach above my head, 
and with my last remaining strength, I pulled myself up, 
and fell upon the surface of the ring. You know the 
rest. I took another dose of the powder, and in a few 
minutes was back among you/' 

The Chemist stopped speaking, and looked at his 
friends. “Well,” he said, “you’ve heard it all. What do 
you think of it?’’ 

“It is a terrible thing to me,” sighed the Very 


“I Must Go Back” 


6 7 

Young Man, “that you did not bring Llyda with you.” 

“It would have been a terrible thing if I had brought 
her. But I am going back for her.” 

“When do you plan to go back?” asked the Doctor 
after a moment. 

“As soon as I can—in a day or two,” answered the 
Chemist. 

“Before you do your work here? You must not,” re¬ 
monstrated the Big Business Man. “Our war here needs 
you, our nation, the whole cause of liberty and freedom 
needs you. You cannot go.” 

“Lylda needs me, too,” returned the Chemist. “I have 
an obligation towards her now, you know, quite apart 
from my own feelings. Understand me, gentlemen,” he 
continued earnestly, “I do not place myself and mine be¬ 
fore the great fight for democracy and justice being 
waged in this world. That would be absurd. But it is 
not quite that way, actually; I can go back for Lylda and 
return here in a week. That week will make little differ¬ 
ence to the war. On the other hand, if I go to France 
first, it may take me a good many months to complete my 
task, and during that time Lylda will be using up her life 
several times faster than I. No, gentlemen, I am going 
to her first.” 

“That week you propose to take,” said the Banker 
slowly, “will cost this world thousands of lives that you 
could save. Have you thought of that?” 

The Chemist flushed. “I can recognize the salvation of 
a nation or a cause,” he returned hotly, “but if I must 
choose between the lives of a thousand men who are not 
dependent on me, and the life or welfare of one woman 
who is, I shall choose the woman.” 

“He’s right, you know,” said the Doctor, and the Very 
Young Man agreed with him fervently. 

Two days later the company met again in the privacy 




68 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

of the club-room. When they had finished dinner, the 
Chemist began in his usual quiet way: 

“I am going to ask you this time, gentlemen, to give 
me a full week. There are four of you—six hours a day 
of watching for each. It need not be too great a hard¬ 
ship. You see,” he continued, as they nodded in agree¬ 
ment, “I want to spend a longer period in the ring world 
this time. I may never go back, and I want to learn, 
in the interest of science, as much about it as I can. I 
was there such a short time before, and it was all so 
strange and remarkable, I confess I learned practically 
nothing. 

“I told you all I could of its history. But of its arts, 
its science, and all its sociological and economic ques¬ 
tions, I got hardly more than a glimpse. It is a world 
and a people far less advanced than ours, yet with some¬ 
thing we have not, and probably never will have—the 
universally distributed milk of human kindness. Yes, 
gentlemen, it is a world well worth studying.” 

The Banker came out of a brown study. “How about 
your formulas for these drugs?” he asked abruptly; 
“where are they?” The Chemist tapped his forehead 
smilingly. “Well, hadn’t you better leave them with 
us?” the Banker pursued. “The hazards of your trip— 
you can’t tell-” 

“Don’t misunderstand me, gentlemen,” broke in the 
Chemist. “I wouldn’t give you those formulas if my 
life and even Lylda’s depended on it. There again you 
do not differentiate between the individual and the race. 
I know you four very well. You are my friends, with all 
the bond that friendship implies. I believe in your in¬ 
tegrity—each of you I trust implicitly. With these form¬ 
ulas you could crush Germany, or you could, any one of 
you, rule the world, with all its treasures for your own. 
These drugs are the most powerful thing for good in the 



“1 Must Go Back” 


69 

world to-day. But they are equally as powerful for evil. 
I would stake my life on what you would do, but I will 
not stake the life of a nation.” 

“I know what I'd do if I had the formulas,” began the 
Very Young Man. 

“Yes, but I don’t know what you’d do,” laughed the 
Chemist. “Don’t you see I’m right?” They admitted 
they did, though the Banker acquiesced very grudgingly. 

“The time of my departure is at hand. Is there any¬ 
thing else, gentlemen, before I leave you?” asked the 
Chemist, beginning to disrobe. 

“Please tell Lylda I want very much to meet her,” said 
the Very Young Man earnestly, and they all laughed. 

When the room was cleared, and the handkerchief and 
ring in place once more, the Chemist turned to them 
again. “Good-by, my friends,” he said, holding out his 
hands. “One week from to-night, at most.” Then he 
took the pills. 

No unusual incident marked his departure. The last 
they saw of him he was calmly sitting on the ring near 
the scratch. 

Then passed the slow days of watching, each taking his 
turn for the allotted six hours. 

By the fifth day, they began to hourly expect the Chem¬ 
ist, but it passed through its weary length, and he did not 
come. The sixth day dragged by, and then came the last 
—the day he had promised would end their watching. 
Still he did not come, and in the evening they gathered, 
and all four watched together, each unwilling to*miss the 
return of the adventurer and his woman from Another 
world. 

But the minutes lengthened into hours, and midnight 
found the white-faced little group, hopeful yet hopeless, 
with fear tugging at their hearts. A second week passed, 
and still they watched, explaining with an optimism they 


70 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

could none of them feel, the non-appearance of their 
friend. At the end of the second week they met again 
to talk the situation over, a dull feeling of fear and hor¬ 
ror possessing them. The Doctor was the first to voice 
what now each of them was forced to believe. “I guess 
it's all useless,” he said. “He’s not coming back.” 

“I don’t hardly dare give him up," said the Big Busi¬ 
ness Man. 

“Me, too,” agreed the Very Young Man sadly. 

The Doctor sat for some time in silence, thoughtfully 
regarding the ring. “My friends,” he began finally, 
“this is too big a thing to deal with in any but the most 
careful way. I can’t imagine what is going on inside 
that ring, but I do know what is happening in our world, 
and what our friend’s return means to civilization here. 
Under the circumstances, therefore, I cannot, I will not 
give him up. 

“I am going to put that ring in a museum and pay for 
having it watched indefinitely. Will you join me?” He 
turned to the Big Business Man as he spoke. 

“Make it a threesome,” said the Banker gruffly. 
“What do you take me for?” and the Very Young Man 
sighed with the tragedy of youth. 


CHAPTER IX 


AFTER FIVE YEARS 

F OUR men sat in the club-room, at their ease in the 
luxurious leather chairs, smoking and talking 
earnestly. Near the center of the room stood a huge ma¬ 
hogany table. On its top, directly in the glare of light 
from an electrolier overhead, was spread a large black 
silk handkerchief. In the center of this handkerchief lay 
a heavy gold band—a woman’s wedding-ring. 

An old-fashioned valise stood near a corner of the 
table. Its sides were perforated with small brass- 
rimmed holes; near the top on one side was a small square 
aperture covered with a wire mesh through which one 
might look into the interior. Altogether, from the out¬ 
side, the bag looked much like those used for carrying 
small animals. 

As it lay on the table now its top was partly open. The 
inside was brightly lighted by a small storage battery and 
electric globe, fastened to the side. Near the bottom of 
the bag was a tiny wire rack, held suspended about an inch 
from the bottom by transverse wires to the sides. The 
inside of the bag was lined with black plush. 

On an arm of the Doctor’s chair lay two white tin 
boxes three or four inches square. In his hand he held 
an opened envelope and several letter pages. 

“A little more than five years ago to-night, my friends,” 
he began slowly, “we sat in this room with that”—he in¬ 
dicated the ring—“under very different circumstances/* 
After a moment, he went on: 

7i 


72 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

“I think I am right when I say that for five years the 
thought uppermost in our minds has always been that ring 
and what is going on within one of its atoms.” 

“You bet,” said the Very Young Man. 

“For five years now we have had the ring watched,” 
continued the Doctor, “but Rogers has never returned.” 

“You asked us here to-night because you had some¬ 
thing special to tell us,” began the Very Young Man, with 
a questioning look at the valise and the ring. 

The Doctor smiled. “I’m sorry,” he said, “I don’t 
mean to be aggravating.” 

“Go ahead in your own way, Frank,” the Big Business 
Man put in. “We’ll wait if we have to.” 

The Doctor glanced at the papers in his hand; he had 
just taken them from the envelope. “You are consumed 
with curiosity, naturally, to know what I have to say— 
why I have brought the ring here to-night. Gentlemen, 
you have had to restrain that curiosity less than five 
minutes; I have had a far greater curiosity to endure— 
and restrain—for over five years. 

“When Rogers left us on his last journey into the ring, 
he gave into my keeping, unknown to you, this envelope.” 
The Doctor held it up. 

“He made me swear I would keep its existence secret 
from every living being, until the date marked upon it, 
at which time, in the event of his not having returned, it 
was to be opened. Look at it.” The Doctor laid the 
envelope on the table. 

“It is inscribed, as you see, ‘To be opened by Dr. Frank 
Adams at 8 p. m. on September 4th, 1923/ For five 
years, gentlemen, I kept that envelope, knowing nothing 
of its contents and waiting for the moment when I might, 
with honor, open it. The struggle has been a hard one. 
Many times I have almost been able to persuade myself, 
in justice to our friend’s safety—his very life, probably— 


After Five Years 73 

that it would be best to disregard his instructions. But 
I did not; I waited until the date set and then, a little 
more than a month ago, alone in my office, I opened the 
envelope/’ 

The Doctor leaned forward in his chair and shuffled 
the papers he held in his hand. His three friends sat 
tense, waiting. 

“The envelope contained these papers. Among them is 
a letter in which I am directed to explain everything to 
you as soon as I succeed in doing certain other things. 
Those things I have now accomplished. So I have sent 
for you. I’ll read you the letter first/’ 

No one spoke when the Doctor paused. The Banker 
drew a long breath. Then he bit the end off a fresh cigar 
and lit it with a shaking hand. The Doctor shifted his 
chair closer to the table under the light. 

“The letter is dated September 14th, 1918. It begins: 
‘This will be read at 8 p. m. on September 4th, 1923, by 
Dr. Frank Adams with no one else present. If the en¬ 
velope has been opened by him previous to that date I 
request him to read no further. If it has fallen into other 
hands than his I can only hope that the reader will im¬ 
mediately destroy it unread/ The Doctor paused an 
instant, then went on. 

“Gentlemen, we are approaching the most important 
events of our lives. An extraordinary duty—a tremen¬ 
dous responsibility, rests with us, of all the millions of 
people on this earth. I ask that you listen most care¬ 
fully.” 

His admonition was quite unnecessary, for no one could 
have been more intent than the three men silently facing 
him. 

The Doctor continued reading: “‘From Dr. Frank 
Adams, I exact the following oath, before he reads 
further. You, Dr. Adams, will divulge to no one, for a 


74 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

period of thirty days, the formulas set down in these 
papers; you will follow implicitly the directions given you; 
you will do nothing that is not expressly stated here. 
Should you be unable to carry out these directions, you 
will destroy this letter and the formulas, and tell no one 
of their ever having been in existence. I must have your 
oath, Dr. Adams, before you proceed further.’ ” 

The Doctor’s voice died away, and he laid the papers 
on the table. 

“Gentlemen,” he went on, “later on in the letter I am 
directed to consult with you three, setting before you this 
whole matter. But before I do so I must exact a similar 
oath from each of you. I must have your word of 
honor, gentlemen, that you will not attempt to transgress 
the instructions given us, and that you will never, by word 
or action, allow a suggestion of what passes between us 
here in this room to-night, to reach any other person. 
Have I your promise?” 

Each of his three hearers found voice to agree. The 
Banker’s face was very red, and he mopped his forehead 
nervously with his handkerchief. 

The Doctor picked up the papers. “The letter goes on: 
‘I am about to venture back into the unknown world of 
the ring. What will befall me there I cannot foretell. 
If by September 4th, 1923, I have not returned, or no 
other mortal has come out of the ring, it is my desire that 
you and the three gentlemen with you at the time of my 
departure, use this discovery of mine for the benefit of 
humanity in your world, or the world in the ring, exactly 
as I myself would have used it were I there. 

“ ‘Should the European war be in progress at that time, 
I direct that you four throw your power on the side of 
the United States for the defeat of the Central Powers. 
That you will be able to accomplish that defeat I cannot 
doubt. 


After Five Years 75 

“ ‘If, on September 4th, 1923, the United States is 
formally at peace with the powers of the world, you are 
forbidden to use these chemicals for any purpose other 
than joining me in the world of the ring. If any among 
you wish to make the venture, which I hope may be the 
case, I request that you do so. 

“ ‘Among these pages you will find a list of fourteen 
chemicals to be used by Dr. Frank Adams during the 
month following September 4, 1923, for the compound¬ 
ing of my powders. Seven of these chemicals (marked 
A), are employed in the drug used to diminish bodily 
size. Those seven marked B are for the drug of opposite 
action. 

“ ‘You will find here a separate description of each 
chemical. Nine are well known and fairly common. Dr. 
Adams will be able to purchase each of them separately 
without difficulty. Three others will have to be especially 
compounded and I have so stated in the directions for 
each of them. Dr. Adams can have them prepared by any 
large chemical manufacturer; I suggest that he have not 
more than one of them compounded by the same company. 

“ ‘The two remaining chemicals must be prepared b]f 
Dr. Adams personally. Their preparation, while in¬ 
tricate, demands no complicated or extensive apparatus. 
I have tried to explain thoroughly the making of these 
two chemicals, and I believe no insurmountable obstacle 
will be met in completing them. 

“ ‘When Dr. Adams has the specified quantities of each 
of these fourteen chemicals in his possession, he will pro¬ 
ceed according to my further directions to compound the 
two drugs. If he is successful in making these drugs, I 
direct that he make known to the three other men referred 
to, the contents of this letter, after first exacting an oath 
from each that its provisions will be carried out. 

“ ‘I think it probable that Dr. Adams will succeed in 


j 6 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

compounding these two drugs. It also seems probable 
that at that time the United States no longer will be at 
war. I make the additional assumption that one or more 
of you gentlemen will desire to join me in the ring. 
Therefore, you will find herewith memoranda of my first 
journey into the ring which I have already described to 
you; I give also the quantities of each drug to be taken 
at various stages of the trip. These notes will refresh 
your memory and will assist you in your journey. 

“ T intend to suggest to Dr. Adams to-day when I hand 
him this letter, that in the event of my failure to return 
within a week, he make some adequate provision for 
guarding the ring in safety. And I must caution you 
now, before starting to join me, if you conclude to do so, 
that you continue this provision, so as to make possible 
your safe return to your own world. 

“ Tf our country is at war at the time you read this, 
your duty is plain. I have no fears regarding your 
course of action. But if not, I do not care to influence 
unduly y6ur decision about venturing into this unknown 
other world. The danger into which I personally may 
have fallen must count for little with you, in a decision 
to hazard your own lives. I may point out, however, 
that such a journey successfully accomplished cannot fail 
but be the greatest contribution to science that has ever 
been made. Nor can I doubt but that your coming may 
prove of tremendous benefit to the humanity of this other 
equally important, though, in our eyes, infinitesimal 
world. 

“ T therefore suggest, gentlemen, that you start your 
journey into the ring at 8 p. m. on the evening of Novem¬ 
ber 4, 1923. You will do your best to find your way 
direct to the city of Arite, where, if I am alive, I will be 
awaiting you.’ ” 


CHAPTER X 


TESTING THE DRUGS 

T HE Doctor laid his papers on the table and looked 
up into the white faces of the three men facing 
him. “That’s all, gentlemen,” he said. 

For a moment no one spoke, and on the face of each 
was plainly written the evidence of an emotion too deep 
for words. The Doctor sorted out the papers in silence, 
glanced over them for a moment, and then reached for a 
large metal ash tray that stood near him on the table. 
Taking a match f~om his pocket he calmly lighted a cor¬ 
ner of the papers and dropped them burning into the 
metal bowl. His friends watched him in awed silence; 
only the Very Young Man found words to protest. 

“Say now, wait,” he began, “why-” 

The Doctor looked at him. “The letter requests me 
to do that,” he said. 

“But I say, the formulas-” persisted the Very 

Young Man, looking wildly at the burning papers. 

The Doctor held up one of the white tin boxes lying 
on the arm of his chair. 

“In these tins,” he said, “I have vials containing the 
specified quantity of each drug. It is ample for our pur¬ 
pose. I have done my best to memorize the formulas. 
But in any event, I was directed to burn them at the time 
of reading you the letter. I have done so.” 

The Big Business Man came out of a brown study. 
“Just three weeks from to-night,” he murmured, “three 
weeks from to-night. It’s too big to realize.” 

77 




78 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

The Doctor put the two boxes on the table, turned his 
chair back toward the others, and lighted a cigar. 

“Gentlemen, let us go over this matter thoroughly,” he 
began. “We have a momentous decision to make. 
Either we destroy those boxes and their contents, or three 
weeks from to-night some or all of us start our journey 
into the ring. I have had a month to think this matter 
over; I have made my decision. 

“I know there is much for you to consider, before you 
can each of you choose your course of action. It is not 
my desire or intention to influence you one way or the 
other. But we can, if you wish, discuss the matter here 
to-night; or we can wait, if you prefer, until each of you 
has had time to think it out for himself.” 

“I'm going,” the Very Young Man burst out. 

His hands were gripping the arms of his chair tightly; 
fhis face was very pale, but his eyes sparkled. 

The Doctor turned to him gravely. 

“Your life is at stake, my boy,” he said, “this is not a 
matter for impulse.” 

“I’m going whether any one else does or not,” persisted 
the Very Young Man. “You can't stop me, either,” he 
added doggedly. “That letter said-” 

The Doctor smiled at the youth’s earnestness. Then 
abruptly he held out his hand. 

“There is no use my holding back my own decision. I 
am going to attempt the trip. And since, as you say, I 
cannot stop you from going,” he added with a twinkle, 
“that makes two of us.” 

They shook hands. The Very Young Man lighted a 
cigarette, and began pacing up and down the room, staring 
hard at the floor. 

“I can remember trying to imagine how I would feel,” 
began the Big Business Man slowly, “if Rogers had asked 
me to go with him when he first went into the ring. It is 



Testing the Drugs 79 

not a new idea to me, for I have thought about it many 
times in the abstract, during the past five years. But now 

that I am face to face with it in reality, it sort of-” 

He broke off, and smiled helplessly around at his com¬ 
panions. 

The Very Young Man stopped in his walk. “Aw, 
come on in,” he began, “the-” 

“Shut up,” growled the Banker, speaking for the first 
time in many minutes. 

“I’m sure we would all like to go,” said the Doctor. 
“The point is, which of us are best fitted for the trip.” 

“None of us are married,” put in the Very Young Man. 

“I’ve been thinking-” began the Banker. “Sup¬ 

pose we get into the ring—how long would we be gone, 
do you suppose?” 

“Who can say?” answered the Doctor smiling. “Per¬ 
haps a month—a year—many years possibly. That is 
one of the hazards of the venture.” 

The Banker went on thoughtfully. “Do you remem¬ 
ber that argument we had with Rogers about time ? Time 
goes twice as fast, didn’t he say, in that other world?” 

“Two and a half times faster, if I remember rightly, 
he estimated,” replied the Doctor. 

The Banker looked at his skinny hands a moment. “I 
owned up to sixty-four once,” he said quizzically. “Two 
years and a half in one year. No, I guess I’ll let you 
young fellows tackle that; I’ll stay here in this world 
where things don’t move so fast.” 

“Somebody’s got to stay,” said the Very Young Man. 
“By golly, you know if we’re all going into that ring it 
would be pretty sad to have anything happen to it while 
we were gone.” 

“That’s so,” said the Banker, looking relieved. “I 
never thought of that.” 

“One of us should stay at least,” said the Doctor. “We 






8 o 


The Girl in the Golden Atom 


cannot take any outsider into our confidence. One of us 
must watch the others go, and then take the ring back to 
its place in the Museum. We will be gone too long a 
time for one person to watch it here.” 

The Very Young Man suddenly went to one of the 
doors and locked it. 

“We don’t want any one coming in,” he explained as he 
crossed the room and locked the others. 

“And another thing,” he went on, coming back to the 
table. “When I saw the ring at the Biological Society 
the other day, I happened to think, suppose Rogers was to 
come out on the underneath side ? It was lying flat, you 
know, just as it is now.” He pointed to where the ring 
lay on the handkerchief before them. “I meant to speak 
to you about it,” he added. 

“I thought of that,” said the Doctor. “When I had 
that case built to bring the ring here, you notice I raised 
it above the bottom a little, holding it suspended in that 
wire frame.” 

“We’d better fix up something like that at the Museum, 
too,” said the Very Young Man, and went back to his 
walk. 

The Big Business Man had been busily jotting down 
figures on the back of an envelope. “I can be in shape to 
go in three weeks,” he said suddenly. 

“Bully for you,” said the Very Young Man. “Then 
it’s all settled.” The Big Business Man went back to his 
notes. 

“I knew what your answer would be,” said the Doctor. 
“My patients can go to the devil. This is too big a 
thing.” 

The Very Young Man picked up one of the tin boxes. 
“Tell us how you made the powders,” he suggested. 

The Doctor took the two boxes and opened them. In- 


8 i 


Testing the Drugs 

side each were a number of tiny glass vials. Those in 
one box were of blue glass; those in the other were red. 

‘‘These vials/’ said the Doctor, “contain tiny pellets of 
the completed drug. That for diminishing size I have 
put in the red vials; those of blue are the other drug. 

“I had rather a difficult time making them—that is, 
compared to what I anticipated. Most of the chemicals I 
bought without difficulty. But when I came to com¬ 
pound those two myself”—the Doctor smiled—“I used to 
think I was a fair chemist in my student days. But now 
—well, at least I got the results, but only because I have 
been working almost night and day for the past month. 
And I found myself with a remarkably complete experi¬ 
mental laboratory when I finished/’ he added. “That 
was yesterday; I spent nearly all last night destroying the 
apparatus, as soon as I found that the drugs had been 
properly made.” 

“They do work?” said the Very Young Man anxiously. 

“They work,” answered the Doctor. “I tried them 
both very carefully.” 

“On yourself?” said the Big Business Man. 

“No, I didn’t think that necessary. I used several in¬ 
sects.” 

“Let’s try them now,” suggested the Very Young Man 
eagerly. 

“Not the big one,” said the Banker. “Once was enough 
for that.” 

“All right,” the Doctor laughed. “We’ll try the other 
if you like.” 

The Big Business Man looked around the room. 
“There’s a few flies around here if we can catch one,” he 
suggested. 

“I’ll bet there’s a cockroach in the kitchen,” said the 
Very Young Man, jumping uo. - , r 


82 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

The Doctor took a brass cneck from his pocket. “I 
thought probably you’d want to try them out. Will you 
get that box from the check-room?” He handed the 
check to the Very Young Man, who hurried out of the 
room. He returned in a moment, gingerly carrying a 
cardboard box with holes perforated in the top. The 
Doctor took the box and lifted the lid carefully. Inside, 
the box was partitioned into two compartments. In one 
compartment were three little lizards about four inches 
long; in the other were two brown sparrows. The Doc¬ 
tor took out one of the sparrows and replaced the cover. 

“Fine,” said the Very Young Man with enthusiasm. 

The Doctor reached for the boxes of chemicals. 

“Not the big one,” said the Banker again, apprehen¬ 
sively. 

“Hold him, will you,” the Doctor said. 

The Very Young Man took the sparrow in his hands. 

“Now,” continued the Doctor, “what we need is a plate 
and a little water.” 

“There’s a tray,” said the Very Young Man, pointing 
with his hands holding the sparrow. 

The Doctor took a spoon from the tray and put a little 
water in it. Then he took one of the tiny pellets from a 
red vial and crushing it in his fingers, sprinkled a few 
grains into that water. 

“Hold that a moment, please.” The Big Business Man 
took the proffered spoon. 

Then the Doctor produced from his pocket a magnify¬ 
ing glass and a tiny pair of silver callipers such as are 
used by jewelers for handling small objects. 

“What’s the idea?” the Very Young Man wanted to 
know. 

“I thought I’d try and put him on the ring,” explained 
the Doctor. “Now, then hold open his beak.” 

The Very Young Man did so, and the Doctor poured 


Testing the Drags 83 

the water down the bird’s throat. Most of it spilled; the 
sparrow twisted its head violently, but evidently some of 
the liquid had gone down the bird’s throat. 

Silence followed, broken after a moment by the scared 
voice of the Very Young Man. “He’s getting smaller, 

I can feel him. He’s getting smaller.” 

“Hold on to him,” cautioned the Doctor. “Bring him 
over here.” They went over to the table by the ring, the 
Banker and the Big Business Man standing close beside 
them. 

“Suppose he tries to fly when we let go of him,” sug¬ 
gested the Very Young Man almost in a whisper. 

“He’ll probably be too confused,” answered the Doc¬ 
tor. “Have you got him?” The sparrow was hardly 
bigger than a large horse-fly now, and the Very Young 
Man was holding it between his thumb and forefinger. 

“Better give him to me,” said the Doctor. “Set him 
down.” 

“He might fly away,” remonstrated the Very Young 

Man. 

“No, he won’t.” 

The Very Young Man put the sparrow on the handker¬ 
chief beside the ring and the Doctor immediately picked 
it up with the callipers. 

“Don’t squeeze him,” cautioned the Very Young Man. 

The sparrow grew steadily smaller, and in a moment the 
Doctor set it carefully on the rim of the ring. 

“Gee him up by the scratch,” whispered the Very Young 
Man. 

t 

The men bent closer over the table, as the Doctor look¬ 
ing through his magnifying glass shoved the sparrow 
slowly along the top of the ring. 

“I can’t see him,” said the Banker. 

“I can,” said the Very Young Man, “right by the 
scratch.” Then after a moment, “he’s gone.” 


84 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

“I’ve got him right over the scratch,” said the Doctor, 
leaning farther down. Then he raised his head and laid 
the magnifying glass and the callipers on the table. 
“He's gone now.” 

“Gosh,” said the Very Young Man, drawing a long 
breath. 

The Banker flung himself into a chair as though ex¬ 
hausted from a great physical effort. 

“Well, it certainly does work,” said the Big Business 
Man, “there’s no question about that.” 

The Very Young Man was shaking the cardboard box 
in his hands and lifting its cover cautiously to see inside. 
“Let’s try a lizard,” he suggested. 

“Oh, what’s the use,” the Banker protested wearily, 
“we know it works.” 

“Well, it can’t hurt anything to try it, can it?” the Very 
Young Man urged. “Besides, the more we try it, the 
more sure we are it will work with us when the time 
comes. You don’t want to try it on yourself, now, do 
you?” he added with a grin. 

“No, thank you,” retorted the Banker with emphasis. 

“I think we might as well try it again,” said the Big 
Business Man. 

The Very Young Man took one of the tiny lizards from 
the box, and in a moment they had dropped some water 
containing the drug down its throat. “Try to put him 
on the scratch, too,” said the Very Young Man. 

When the lizard was small enough the Doctor held it 
with the callipers and then laid it on the ring. 

“Look at him walk ; look at him walk,” whispered the 
Very Young Man excitedly. The lizard, hardly more 
than an eighth of an inch long now, but still plainly 
visible, was wriggling along the top of the ring. “Shove 
him up by the scratch,” he added. 


Testing the Drugs 85 

In a moment more the reptile was too small for any 
but the Doctor with his glass to see. “I guess he got 
there,” he said finally with a smile, as he straightened up. 
“He was going fast.” 

“Well, that’s all right,” said the Very Young Man with 
a sigh of relief. 

The four men again seated themselves; the Big Busi¬ 
ness Man went back to his figures. 

“When do you start?” asked the Banker after a mo¬ 
ment. 

“November 4th—8 p. m.,” answered the Doctor. 
“Three weeks from to-night.” 

“We’ve a lot to do,” said the Banker. 

“What will this cost, do you figure?” asked the Big 
Business Man, looking up from his notes. 

The Doctor considered a moment. 

“We can’t take much with us, you know,” he said 
slowly. Then he took a sheet of memoranda from his 
pockets. “I have already spent for apparatus and chem¬ 
icals to prepare the drugs”—he consulted his figures— 
“seventeen hundred and forty dollars, total. What we 
have still to spend will be very little, I should think. I 
propose we divide it three ways as we have been doing 
with the Museum?” 

“Four ways,” said the Very Young Man. “I’m no 
kid any more. I got a good job—that is,” he added 
with a rueful air, “I had a good job. To-morrow I 
quit.” 

“Four ways,” the Doctor corrected himself gravely. 
“I guess we can manage that.” 

“What can we take with us, do you think?” asked the 
Big Business Man. 

“I think we should try strapping a belt around our 
waists, with pouches in it,” said the Doctor. “I doubt 






86 


The Girl in the Golden Atom 


if it would contract with our bodies, but still it might. If 
it didn’t there would be no harm done; we could leave it 
behind.” 

“You want food and water,” said the Banker. “Rem¬ 
ember that barren country you are going through.” 

“And something on our feet,” the Big Business Man 
put in. 

“I’d like to take a revolver, too,” said the Very Young 
Man. “It might come in awful handy.” 

“As I remember Rogers’s description,” said the Doc¬ 
tor thoughtfully, “the trip out is more difficult than go¬ 
ing down. We mustn’t overlook preparations for that; 
it is most imperative we should be careful.” 

“Say, talking about getting back,” burst out the Very 
Young Man. “I’d like to see that other drug work first. 
It would be pretty rotten to get in there and have it go 
back on us, wouldn’t it? Oh, golly!” The Very Young 
Man sank back in his chair overcome by the picture he 
had conjured up. 

“I tried it,” said the Doctor. “It works.” 

“I’d like to see it again with something different,” said 
the Big Business Man. “It can’t do any harm.” The 
Banker looked his protest, but said nothing. 

“What shall we try, a lizard?” suggested the Very 
Young Man. The Doctor shrugged his shoulders. 

“What’ll we kill it with? Oh, I know.” The Very 
Young Man picked up a heavy metal paper-weight from 
the desk. “This’ll do the trick, fine,” he added. 

Then, laying the paper-weight carefully aside, he 
dipped up a spoonful of water and offered it to the Doc¬ 
tor. 

“Not that water this time,” said the Doctor, shaking 
his head with a smile. 

The Very Young Man looked blank. 

“Organisms in it,” the Doctor explained briefly. “All 


Testing the Drugs 87 

right for them to get small from the other chemical, but 
we don’t want them to get large and come out at us, do 
we?” 

“Holy Smoke, I should say not,” said the Very Young 
Man, gasping; and the Banker growled: 

“Something’s going to happen to us, playing with fire 
like this.” 

The Doctor produced a little bottle. “I boiled this 
water,” he said. “We can use this.” 

It took but a moment to give the other drug to one of 
the remaining lizards, although they spilled more of the 
water than went down its throat. 

“Don’t forget to hit him, and don’t you wait very 
long,” said the Banker warningly, moving nearer the 
door. 

“Oh, I’ll hit him all right, don’t worry,” said the Very 
Young Man, brandishing the paper-weight. 

The Doctor knelt down, and held the reptile pinned to 
the floor; the Very Young Man knelt beside him. Slowly 
the lizard began to increase in size. 

“He's growing,” said the Banker. “Hit him, boy, 
what’s the use of waiting; he’s growing.” 

The lizard was nearly a foot long now, and struggling 
violently between the Doctor’s fingers. 

“You’d better kill him,” said the Doctor, “he might get 
away from me.” The Very Young Man obediently 
brought his weapon down with a thump upon the reptile’s 
head. 

“Keep on,” said the Banker. “Be sure he’s dead.” 

The Very Young Man pounded the quivering body for 
a moment. The Big Business Man handed him a nap¬ 
kin from the tray and the Very Young Man wrapped up 
the lizard and threw it into the waste-basket. 

Then he rose to his feet and tossed the paper-weight on 
to the desk with a crash. 


88 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

“Well, gentlemen,” he said, turning back to them with 
flushed face, “those drugs sure do work. We’re going 
into the ring all right, three weeks from to-night, and 
nothing on earth can stop us.” 





CHAPTER XI 


THE ESCAPE OF THE DRUG 

F OR the next hour the four friends busily planned 
their preparations for the journey. When they be¬ 
gan to discuss the details of the trip, and found them¬ 
selves face to face with so hazardous an adventure, each 
discovered a hundred things in his private life that needed 
attention. 

The Doctor’s phrase, “My patients can go to the devil,” 
seemed to relieve his mind of all further responsibility 
towards his personal affairs. 

“That’s all very well for you,” said the Big Business 
Man, “I’ve too many irons in the fire just to drop every¬ 
thing—there are too many other people concerned. And 
I’ve got to plan as though I were never coming back, you 
know.” 

“Your troubles are easy,” said the Very Young Man. 
“I’ve got a girl. I wonder what she’ll say. Oh, gosh, I 
can’t tell her where I'm going, can I? I never thought 
of that.” He scratched his head with a perplexed air. 
“That’s tough on her. Well, I’m glad I’m an orphan, 
anyway.” 

The actual necessities of the trip needed a little dis¬ 
cussion, for what they could take with them amounted to 
practically nothing. 

“As I understand it,” said the Banker, “all I have to do 
is watch you start, and then take the ring back to the 
Museum.” 

“Take it carefully,” continued the Very Young Man. 

“Remember what it’s got in it.” 

89 


90 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

“You will give us about two hours to get well started 
down,” said the Doctor. “After that it will be quite safe 
to move the ring. You can take it back to the Society 
in that case I brought it here in.” 

“Be sure you take it yourself,” put in the Very Young 
Man. “Don’t trust it to anybody else. And how about 
having that wire rack fixed for it at the Museum,” he 
added. “Don’t forget that.” 

“I’ll have that done myself this week,” said the Doctor. 

They had been talking for perhaps an hour when the 
Banker got up from his chair to get a fresh cigar from 
a box that lay upon the desk. He happened to glance 
across the room and on the floor in the corner by the 
closed door he saw a long, flat object that had not been 
there before. It was out of the circle of light and being 
brown against the polished hardwood floor, he could not 
make it out clearly. But something about it frightened 
him. 

“What’s that over there?” he asked, standing still and 
pointing. 

The Big Business Man rose from his seat and took a 
few steps in the direction of the Banker’s outstretched 
hand. Then with a muttered oath he jumped to the desk 
in a panic and picking up the heavy paper-weight flung 
it violently across the room. It struck the panelled wall 
with a crash and bounded back towards him. At the 
same instant there came a scuttling sound from the floor, 
and a brown shape slid down the edge of the room and 
stopped in the other corner. 

All four men were on their feet in an instant, white¬ 
faced and trembling. 

“Good God,” said the Big Business Man huskily, “that 
thing over there—that-” 

“Turn on the side lights—the side lights!” shouted the 
Doctor, running across the room. 



The Escape of the Drug 91 

In the glare of the unshaded globes on the wall the 
room was brightly lighted. On the floor in the corner the 
horrified men saw a cockroach nearly eighteen inches in 
length, with its head facing the angle of wall, and scratch¬ 
ing with its legs against the base board as though about to 
climb up. For a moment the men stood silent with sur¬ 
prise and terror. Then, as they stared they saw the cock¬ 
roach was getting larger. The Big Business Man laid 
his hand on the Doctor’s arm with a grip that made the 
Doctor wince. 

“Good God, man, look at it—it’s growing,” he said in 
a voice hardly above a whisper. 

“It’s growing,” echoed the Very Young Man; “it’s 
growing!” 

And then the truth dawned upon them, and brought 
with it confusion, almost panic. The cockroach, fully 
two feet long now, had raised the front end of its body a 
foot above the floor, and was reaching up the wall with its 
legs. 

The Banker made a dash for the opposite door. “Let’s 
get out of here. Come on!” he shouted. 

The Doctor stopped him. Of the four men, he was the 
only one who had retained his self-possession. 

“Listen to me,” he said. His voice trembled a little in 
spite of his efforts to control it. “Listen to me. That— 
that—thing cannot harm us yet.” He looked from one to 
the other of them and spoke swiftly. “It’s gruesome and 
—and loathsome, but it is not dangerous—yet. But we 
cannot run from it. We must kill it—here, now, before 
it gets any larger.” 

The Banker tore himself loose and started again to¬ 
wards the door. 

“You fool!” said the Doctor, with a withering look. 
“Don’t you see, it’s life or death later. That—that thing 
will be as big as this house in half an hour. Don’t you 


The Girl in the Golden Atom 


9 2 

know that? As big as this house. We've got to kill it 
now—now.” 

The Big Business Man ran towards the paper-weight. 
“I’ll hit it with this,” he said. 

“You can't,” said the Doctor, “you might miss. We 
haven't time. Look at it,” he added. 

The cockroach was noticeably larger now—considerably 
over two feet; it had turned away from the wall to face 
them. 

The Very Young Man had said nothing; only stood and 
stared with bloodless face and wide-open eyes. Then 
suddenly he stooped, and picking up a small rug from the 
floor—a rug some six feet long and half as wide—ad¬ 
vanced slowly towards the coackroach. 

“That’s the idea,” encouraged the Doctor. “Get it 
under that. Here, give me part of it.” He grasped a 
corner of the rug. “You two go up the other sides”— 
he pointed with his free hand—“and head it off if it 
runs.” 

Slowly the four men crept forward. The cockroach, 
three feet long now, was a hideous, horrible object as it 
stood backed into the corner of the room, the front part 
of its body swaying slowly from side to side. 

“We'd better make a dash for it,” whispered the Very 
Young Man; and jerking the rug loose from the Doctor’s 
grasp, he leaped forward and flung himself headlong 
upon the floor, with the rug completely under him. 

“I've got the damned thing. I’ve got it!” he shouted. 
“Help—you. Help!” 

The three men leaped with him upon the rug, holding it 
pinned to the floor. The Very Young Man, as he lay, 
could feel the curve of the great body underneath, and 
could hear the scratch of its many legs upon the floor. 

“Hold down the edges of the rug!” he cried. “Don't 
let it out. Don’t let it get out. I’ll smash it.” He 



The Escape of the Drug 93 

raised himself on his hands and knees, and came down 
heavily. The rug gave under his thrust as the insect flat¬ 
tened out; then they could hear again the muffled scratch¬ 
ing of its legs upon the floor as it raised the rug up under 
the Very Young Man’s weight. 

“We can’t kill it,” panted the Big Business Man. “Oh, 
we can’t kill it. Good God, how big it is!” 

The Very Young Man got to his feet and stood un¬ 
steadily on the bulge of the rug. Then he jumped into 
the air and landed solidly on his heels. There was a sharp 
crack as the shell of the insect broke under the sharpness 
of his blow. 

“That did it; that’ll do it!” he shouted. Then he 
leaped again. 

“Let me,” said the Big Business Man. “I’m heavier”; 
and he, too, stamped upon the rug with his heels. 

They could hear the huge shell of the insect’s back 
smash under his weight, and when he jumped again, the 
squash of its body as he mashed it down. 

“Wait,” said the Doctor. “We’ve killed it.” 

They eased upon the rug a little, but there was no 
movement from beneath. 

“Jump on it harder,” said the Very Young Man. 
“Don’t let’s take a chance. Mash it good.” 

The Big Business Man continued stamping violently 
upon the rug; joined now by the Very Young Man. The 
Doctor sat on the floor beside it, breathing heavily; the 
Banker lay in a heap at its foot in utter collapse. 

As they stamped, the rug continued to flatten down; it 
sank under their tread with a horrible, sickening, squash¬ 
ing sound. 

“Let’s look,” suggested the Very Young Man. “It 
must be dead”; and he threw back a corner of the rug. 
The men turned sick and faint at what they saw. 

Underneath the rug, mashed against the floor, lay a 


94 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

great, noisome, semi-liquid mass of brown and white. It 
covered nearly the entire under-surface of the rug—a hun¬ 
dred pounds, perhaps, of loathsome pulp and shell, from 
which a stench arose that stopped their breathing. 

With a muttered imprecation the Doctor flung back the 
rug to cover it, and sprang to his feet, steadying himself 
against a chair. 

“We killed it in time, thank God,” he murmured and 
dropped into the chair, burying his face in his hands. 

For a time silence fell upon the room, broken only by 
the labored breathing of the four men. Then the Big 
Business Man sat up suddenly. “Oh, my God, what 
an experience!” he groaned, and got unsteadily to his 
feet. 

The Very Young Man helped the Banker up and led 
him to a seat by the window, which he opened, letting in 
the fresh, cool air of the night. 

“How did the drug get loose, do you suppose?” asked 
the Wry Young Man, coming back to the center of the 
room. He had recovered his composure somewhat, 
though he was still very pale. He lighted a cigarette 
and sat down beside the Doctor. 

The Doctor raised his head wearily. “I suppose we 
must have spilled some of it on the floor,” he said, “and 

the cockroach-” He stopped abruptly and sprang to 

his feet. 

“Good God!” he cried. “Suppose another one-” 

On the bare floor beside the table they came upon a 
few drops of water. 

“That must be it,” said the Doctor. He pulled his 
handkerchief from his pocket; then he stopped in thought. 
“No, that won’t do. What shall we do with it?” he 
added. “We must destroy it absolutely. Good Lord, if 
that drug ever gets loose upon the world-” 

The Big Business Man joined them. 






The Escape of the Drug 95 

“We must destroy it absolutely,'’ repeated the Doctor. 
“We can’t just wipe it up.” 

“Some acid,” suggested the Big Business Man. 

“Suppose something else has got at it already,” the 
Very Young Man said in a scared voice, and began hastily 
looking around the floor of the room. 

“You’re right,” agreed the Doctor. “We mustn’t 
take any chance; we must look thoroughly.” 

Joined by the Banker, the four men began carefully go¬ 
ing over the room. 

“You’d better watch that nothing gets at it,” the Very 
Young Man thought suddenly to say. The Banker obe¬ 
diently sat down by the little pool of water on the floor. 

“And I’ll close the window,” added the Very Young 
Man; “something might get out.” 

They searched the room thoroughly, carefully scanning 
its walls and ceiling, but could see nothing out of the or¬ 
dinary. 

“We’ll never be quite sure,” said the Doctor finally, 
“but I guess we’re safe. It’s the best we can do now, at 
any rate.” 

He joined the Banker by the table. “I’ll get some 
nitric acid,” he added. “I don’t know what else-” 

“We’ll have to get that out of here, too,” said the Big 
Business Man, pointing to the rug. “God knows how 
we’ll explain it.” 

The Doctor picked up one of the tin boxes of drugs and 
held it in his hand meditatively. Then he looked over 
towards the rug. From under one side a brownish liquid 
was oozing; the Doctor shuddered. 

“My friends,” he said, holding up the box before them, 
“we can realize now something of the terrible power we 
have created and imprisoned here. We must guard it 
carefully, gentlemen, for if it escapes—it will destroy the 
world.” 



CHAPTER XII 


THE START 

•< • ^ 

O N the evening of November 4th, 1923, the four 
friends again assembled at the Scientific Club for 
the start of their momentous adventure. The Doctor was 
the last to arrive, and found the other three anxiously 
awaiting him. He brought with him the valise contain¬ 
ing the ring and a suit-case with the drugs and equip¬ 
ment necessary for the journey. He greeted his friends 
gravely. 

“The time has come, gentlemen,” he said, putting the 
suitcase on the table. 

The Big Business Man took out the ring and held it in 
his hand thoughtfully. 

“The scene of our new life,” he said with emotion. 
“What does it hold in store for us?” 

“What time is it?” asked the Very Young Man. 
“We’ve got to hurry. We want to get started on time— 
we mustn't be late.” 

“Everything’s ready, isn’t it?” asked the Banker. 
“Who has the belts?” 

“They’re in my suit-case,” answered the Very Young 
Man. “There it is.” 

The Doctor laid the ring and handkerchief on the floor 
under the light and began unpacking from his bag the 
drugs and the few small articles they had decided to try 
and take with them. “You have the food and water,” 
he said. 

The Big Business Man produced three small flasks of 

96 


The Start 


97 

water and six flat, square tins containing compressed 
food. The Very Young Man opened one of them. 
“Chocolate soldiers we are,” he said, and laughed. 

The Banker was visibly nervous and just a little 
frightened. “Are you sure you haven’t forgotten some¬ 
thing?” he asked, quaveringly. 

“It wouldn’t make a great deal of difference if we had,” 
said the Doctor, with a smile. “The belts may not con¬ 
tract with us at all; we may have to leave them behind.” 

“Rogers didn’t take anything,” put in the Very Young 
Man. “Come on; let’s get undressed. 

The Banker locked the doors and sat down to watch the 
men make their last preparations. They spoke little while 
they were disrobing; the solemnity of what they were 
about to do both awed and frightened them. Only the 
Very Young Man seemed exhilarated by the excitement of 
the coming adventure. 

In a few moments the three men were dressed in their 
white woolen bathing suits. The Very Young Man was 
the first to be fully equipped. 

“I’m ready,” he announced. “All but the chemicals. 
Where are they ?” 

Around his waist he had strapped a broad cloth belt, 
with a number of pockets fastened to it. On his feet 
were felt-lined cloth shoes, with hard rubber soles; he 
wore a wrist watch. Under each armpit was fastened 
the pouch for carrying the drugs. 

“Left arm for red vials,” said the Doctor. “Be sure of 
that—we mustn’t get them mixed. Take two of each 
color.” He handed the Very Young Man the tin boxes. 

All the men were ready in a moment more. 

“Five minutes of eight,” said the Very Young Man, 
looking at his watch. “We’re right on time; let’s get 
started.” 

The Banker stood up among them. “Tell me what 




The Girl in the Golden Atom 


98 

I’ve got to do,” he said helplessly. “You’re going all 
but me; I’ll be left behind alone.” 

The Big Business Man laid his hand on the Banker’s 
shoulder affectionately. “Don’t look so sad, George,” he 
said, with an attempt at levity. “We’re not leaving you 
forever—we're coming back.” 

The Banker pressed his friend’s hand. His usual 
crusty manner was quite gone now; he seemed years older. 

The Doctor produced the same spoon he had used 
when the Chemist made his departure into the ring. 
“I’ve kept it all this time,” he said, smiling. “Per¬ 
haps it will bring us luck.” He handed it to the 
Banker. 

“What you have to do is this,” he continued seriously. 
“We shall all take an equal amount of the drug at the 
same instant. I hope it will act upon each of us at the 
same rate, so that we may diminish uniformly in size, and 
thus keep together.” 

“Gosh!” said the Very Young Man. “I never thought 
of that. Suppose it doesn’t?” 

“Then we shall have to adjust the difference by taking 
other smaller amounts of the drug. But I think probably 
it will. 

“You must be ready,” he went on to the Banker, “to 
help us on to the ring if necessary.” 

“Or put us back if we fall off,” said the Very Young 
Man. “I’m going to sit still until I’m pretty small. Gra¬ 
cious, it’s going to feel funny.” 

“After we have disappeared,” continued the Doctor, 
“you will wait, say, until eleven o’clock. Watch the ring 
carefully—some of us may have to come back before that 
time. At eleven o’clock pack up everything”—he looked 
around the littered room with a smile—“and take the ring 
back to the Biological Society.” 

“Keep your eye on it on the way back,” warned the 


The Start 


99 

Very Young Man. “Suppose we decide to come out some 
time later to-night—you can’t tell.” 

“I’ll watch it all night to-night, here and at the Mu¬ 
seum/* said the Banker, mopping his forehead. 

“Good scheme,” said the Very Young Man approv¬ 
ingly. “Anything might happen.” 

“Well, gentlemen,” said the Doctor, “I believe we’re all 
ready. Come on, Will.” 

The Big Business Man was standing by the window, 
looking out intently. He evidently did not hear the re¬ 
mark addressed to him, for he paid no attention. The 
Doctor joined him. 

Through the window they could see the street below, 
crowded now with scurrying automobiles. The side¬ 
walks were thronged with people—theater-goers, hurry¬ 
ing forward, seeking eagerly their evening’s pleasure. It 
had been raining, and the wet pavements shone with long, 
blurred yellow glints from the thousands of lights above. 
Down the street they could see a huge blazing theater sign, 
with the name of a popular actress spelt in letters of 
fire. 

The Big Business Man threw up the window sash and 
took a deep breath of the moist, cool air of the night. 

“Good-by, old world,” he murmured with emotion. 
“Shall I see you again, I wonder?” He stood a moment 
longer, silently staring at the scene before him. Then 
abruptly he closed the window, pulled down the shade, and 
turned back to the room. 

“Come on,” said the Very Young Man impatiently. 
“It’s five minutes after eight. Let’s get started.” 

“Just one thing before we start,” said the Doctor, as 
they gathered in the center of the room. “We must un¬ 
derstand, gentlemen, from the moment we first take the 
drug, until we reach our final smallest size, it is impera¬ 
tive, or at least highly desirable, that we keep together. 


ioo The Girl in the Golden Atom 

We start by taking four of the pellets each, according to 
the memoranda Rogers left. By Jove!” he interrupted 
himself, “that’s one thing important we did nearly for¬ 
get.” 

He went to his coat, and from his wallet took several 
typewritten sheets of paper. 

“I made three copies,” he said, handing them to his 
companions. “Put them away carefully; the front pocket 
will be most convenient, probably. 

“It may not be hard for us to keep together,” continued 
the Doctor. “On the other hand, we may find it ex¬ 
tremely difficult, if not quite impossible. In the latter 
event we will meet at the city of Arite. 

“There are two things we must consider. First, we 
shall be constantly changing size with relation to our sur¬ 
roundings. In proportion to each other, we must re¬ 
main normal in size if we can. Secondly we shall be 
traveling—changing position in our surroundings. So 
far as that aspect of the trip is concerned, it will not be 
more difficult for us to keep together, probably, than dur¬ 
ing any adventurous journey here in this world. 

“If through accident or any unforeseen circumstance 
we are separated in size, the one being smallest shall wait 
for the others. That can be accomplished by taking a 
very small quantity of the other drug—probably merely 
by touching one of the pellets to the tongue. Do I make 
myself clear?” His friends nodded assent. 

“If any great separation in relative size occurs,” the 
Doctor went on, “a discrepancy sufficient to make the 
smallest of us invisible for a time to the others, then an¬ 
other problem presents itself. We must be very careful, 
in that event, not to change our position in space—not to 
keep on traveling, in other words—or else, when we be¬ 
come the same size once more, we will be out of sight of 



The Start 


IOI 


one another. Geographically separated, so to speak,” 
the Doctor finished with a smile. 

“I am so explicit on this point of keeping together,” he 
continued, “because—well, I personally do not want to 
undertake even part of this journey alone.” 

“You’re darn right—me neither,” agreed the Very 
Young Man emphatically. “Let’s get going.” 

“I guess that’s all,” said the Doctor, with a last glance 
around, and finally facing the Banker. “Good-by, 
George.” 

The Banker was quite overcome, and without a word he 
shook hands with each of his friends. 

The three men sat beside each other on the floor, close 
to the handkerchief and ring; the Banker sat in his chair 
on the other side, facing them, spoon in hand. In silence 
they each took four of the pellets. Then the Banker saw 
them close their eyes; he saw the Big Business Man put 
his hands suddenly on the floor as though to steady him¬ 
self. 

The Banker gripped the arms of his chair firmly. He 
knew exactly what to expect, yet now when his friends 
began slowly to diminish in size he was filled with sur¬ 
prise and horror. For several minutes no one spoke. 
Then the Very Young Man opened his eyes, looked 
around dizzily for an instant, and began feeling with his 
hands the belt at his waist, his shoes, wrist-watch, and 
the pouches under his armpits. 

“It’s all right,” he said with an enthusiasm that con¬ 
trasted strangely with the tremor in his voice. “The 
belt’s getting smaller, too. We’re going to be able to take 
everything with us.” 

Again silence fell on the room, broken only by the 
sound of the three men on the floor continually shifting 
their positions as they grew smaller. In another moment 



102 


The Girl in the Golden Atom 

the Doctor clambered unsteadily to his feet and, taking a 
step backward, leaned up against the cylindrical mahogany 
leg of the center-table, flinging his arms around it. His 
head did not reach the table-top. 

The Very Young Man and the Big Business Man were 
on their feet now, too, standing at the edge of the hand¬ 
kerchief, and clinging to one another for support. The 
Banker looked down at them and tried to smile. The 
Very Young Man waved his hand, and the Banker found 
voice to say: “Good-by, my boy.” 

“Good-by, sir,” echoed the Very Young Man. “We’re 
making it.” 

Steadily they grew smaller. By this time the Doctor 
had become far too small for his arms to encircle the leg 
of the table. The Banker looked down to the floor, and 
saw him standing beside the table leg, leaning one hand 
against it as one would lean against the great stone 
column of some huge building. 

“Good-by, Frank,” said the Banker. But the Doctor 
did not answer; he seemed lost in thought. 

Several minutes more passed in silence. The three men 
had diminished in size now until they were not more 
than three inches high. Suddenly the Very Young Man 
let go of the Big Business Man’s arm and looked around 
to where the Doctor was still leaning pensively against 
the table leg. The Banker saw him speak swiftly to the 
Big Business Man, but in so small a voice he could not 
catch the words. Then both little figures turned towards 
the table, and the Banker saw the Very Young Man put 
his hands to his mouth and shout. And upward to him 
came the shrillest, tiniest little voice he had ever heard, 
yet a voice still embodying the characteristic intonation 
of the Very Young Man. 

“Hey, Doctor!” came the words. “You’ll never get 
here if you don’t come now.” 


The Start 


103 


The Doctor looked up abruptly; he evidently heard the 
words and realized his situation. (He was by this time 
not more than an inch and a half in height.) He hesi¬ 
tated only a moment, and then, as the other two little 
figures waved their arms wildly, he began running 
towards them. For more than a minute he ran. The 
Very Young Man started towards him, but the Doctor 
waved him back, redoubling his efforts. 

When he arrived at the edge of the handkerchief, evi¬ 
dently he was nearly winded, for he stopped beside his 
friends, and stood breathing heavily. The Banker leaned 
forwards, and could see the three little figures (they were 
not as big as the joint of his little finger) talking ear¬ 
nestly; the Very Young Man was gesticulating wildly, 
pointing towards the ring. One of them made a start, 
but the others called him back. 

Then they began waving their arms, and all at once the 
Banker realized they were waving at him. He leaned 
down, and by their motions knew that something was 
wrong—that they wanted him to do something. 

Trembling with fright, the Banker left his chair and 
knelt upon the floor. The Very Young Man made a 
funnel of his hands and shouted up: “It’s too far away. 
We can’t make it—we’re too small!” 

The Banker looked his bewilderment. Then he 
thought suddenly of the spoon that he still held in his 
hand, and he put it down towards them. The three little 
figures ducked and scattered as the spoon in the Banker’s 
trembling fingers neared them. 

“Not that—the ring. Bring it closer. Hurry— 
Hurry!” shouted the Very Young Man. The Banker, 
leaning closer, could just hear the words. Comprehend¬ 
ing at last, he picked up the ring and laid it near the edge 
of the handkerchief. Immediately the little figures ran 
over to it and began climbing up. 


104 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

The Very Young Man was the first to reach it; the 
Banker could see him vault upwards and land astraddle 
upon its top. The Doctor was up in a moment more, and 
the two were reaching down their hands to help up the 
Big Business Man. The Banker slid the spoon carefully 
along the floor towards the ring, but the Big Business 
Man waved it away. The Banker laid the spoon aside, 
and when he looked at the ring again the Big Business 
Man was up beside his companions, standing upright with 
them upon the top of the ring. 

The Banker stared so long and intently, his vision 
blurred. He closed his eyes for a moment, and when he 
opened them again the little figures on the top of the 
ring had disappeared. 

The Banker felt suddenly sick and faint in the closeness 
of the room. Rising to his feet, he hurried to a window 
and threw up the sash. A gust of rain and wind beat 
against his face as he stood leaning on the sill. He felt 
much better after a few moments; and remembering his 
friends, he closed the window and turned back towards 
the ring. At first he thought he could just make them 
out, but when he got down on the floor close beside the 
ring, he saw nothing. 

Almost unnerved, he sat down heavily upon the floor 
beside the handkerchief, leaning on one elbow. A corner 
of the handkerchief was turned back, and one side was 
ruffled where the wind from the opened window had 
blown it up. He smoothed out the handkerchief care¬ 
fully. 

For some time the Banker sat quiet, reclining uncom¬ 
fortably upon the hard floor. The room was very still— 
its silence oppressed him. He stared stolidly at the ring, 
his head in a turmoil. The ring looked oddly out of place, 
lying over near one edge of the handkerchief; he had al¬ 
ways seen it in the center before. Abruptly he put out 


The Start 


105 

his hand and picked it up. Then remembrance of the 
Doctor’s warning flooded over him. In sudden panic he 
put the ring down again, almost in the same place at the 
edge of the handkerchief. 

Trembling all over, he looked at his watch; it was a 
quarter to nine. He rose stiffly to his feet and sank into 
his chair. After a moment he lighted a cigar. The 
handkerchief lay at his feet; he could just see the ring 
over the edge of his knees. For a long time he sat 
staring. 

The striking of a church clock near-by roused him. 
He shook himself together and blinked at the empty room. 
In his hand he held an unlighted cigar; mechanically he 
raised it to his lips. The sound of the church bells died 
away; the silence of the room and the loneliness of it 
made him shiver. He looked at his watch again. Ten 
o’clock! Still another hour to wait and watch, and then 
he could take the ring back to the Museum. He glanced 
down at the ring; it was still lying by the edge of the 
handkerchief. 

Again the Banker fell into a stupor as he stared at the 
glistening gold band lying on the floor at his feet. How 
lonely he felt! Yet he was not alone, he told himself. 
His three friends were still there, hardly two feet from the 
toe of his shoe. He wondered how they were making 
out. Would they come back any moment? Would they 
ever come back ? 

And then the Banker found himself worrying because 
the ring was not in the center of the handkerchief. 

He felt frightened, and he wondered why. Again he 
looked at his watch. They had been gone more than two 
hours now. Swiftly he stooped, and lifting the ring, 
gazed at it searchingly, holding it very close to his eyes.. 
Then he carefully put it down in the center of the hand¬ 
kerchief, and lay back in his chair with a long sigh of re- 


io6 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

lief. It was all right now; just a little while to wait, and 
then he could take it back to the Museum. In a moment 
his eyes blinked, closed, and soon he was fast asleep, lying 
sprawled out in the big leather chair and breathing 
heavily. 


CHAPTER XIII 


PERILOUS WAYS 

T HE Very Young Man sat on the floor, between his 
two friends at the edge of the handkerchief, and 
put the first pellets of the drug to his tongue. His heart 
was beating furiously; his forehead was damp with the 
sweat of excitement and of fear. The pellets tasted 
sweet, and yet a little acrid. He crushed them in his 
mouth and swallowed them hastily. 

In the silence of the room, the ticking of his watch sud¬ 
denly sounded very loud. He raised his arm and looked 
at its face; it was just ten minutes past eight. He con¬ 
tinued to stare at its dial, wondering why nothing was 
happening to him. Then all at once the figures on the 
watch became very sharp and vivid; he could see them 
with microscopic clearness. A buzzing sounded in his 
ears. 

He remembered having felt the same way just before 
he fainted. He drew a deep breath and looked around the 
room; it swam before his gaze. He closed his eyes and 
waited, wondering if he would faint. The buzzing in his 
head grew louder; a feeling of nausea possessed him. 

After a moment his head cleared; he felt better. Then 
all at once he realized that the floor upon which he sat was 
moving. It seemed to be shifting out from under him 
in all directions. lie sat with his feet flat upon the floor, 
his knees drawn close against his chin. And the floor 
seemed to be carrying his feet farther out; he constantly 

had to be pulling them back against him. He put one 

107 


io8 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

hand clown beside him, and could feel his fingers dragging 
very slowly as the polished surface moved past. The 
noise in his head was almost gone now. He opened his 
eyes. 

Before him, across the handkerchief the Banker sat in 
his chair. He had grown enormously in size, and as the 
Very Young Man looked he could see him and the chair 
growing steadily larger. He met the Banker’s anxious 
glance, and smiled up at him. Then he looked at his two 
friends, sitting on the floor beside him. They alone, of 
everything within his range of vision, had grown no 
larger. 

The Very Young Man thought of the belt around his 
waist. He put his hand to it, and found it tight as be¬ 
fore. So, after all, they would not have to leave anything 
behind, he thought. 

The Doctor rose to his feet and turned away, back 
under the huge table that loomed up behind him. The 
Very Young Man got up, too, and stood beside the Big- 
Business Man, holding to him for support. His head felt 
strangely confused; his legs were weak and shaky. 

Steadily larger grew the room and everything in it. 
The Very Young Man turned his eyes up to the light 
high overhead. Its great electric bulbs dazzled him with 
their brilliancy; its powerful glare made objects around 
as bright as though in daylight. After a moment the Big 
Business Man’s grip on his arm tightened. 

“God, it’s weird!’’ he said in a tense whisper. 
“Look r 

Before them spread a great, level, shining expanse of 
black, with the ring in its center—a huge golden circle. 
Beyond the farther edge of the black they could see the 
feet of the banker, and the lower part of his legs stretch¬ 
ing into the air far above them. 

The Very Young Man looked up still higher, and saw 


IOC) 


Perilous Ways 

the Banker staring down at him. “Good-by, my boy,” 
said the Banker. His voice came from far away in a 
great roar to the Very Young Man’s ears. 

“Good-by, sir,” said the Very Young Man, and waved 
his hand. 

Several minutes passed, and still the Very Young Man 
stood holding to his companion, and watching the expanse 
of handkerchief widening out and the gleaming ring 
growing larger. Then he thought of the Doctor, and 
turned suddenly to look behind him. Across the wide, 
glistening surface of the floor stood the Doctor, leaning 
against the tremendous column that the Very Young Man 
knew was the leg of the center-table. And as the Very 
Young Man stood staring, he could see this distance be¬ 
tween them growing steadily greater. A sudden fear 
possessed him, and he shouted to his friend. 

“Good Lord, suppose he can't make it!” said the Big 
Business Man fearfully. 

“He’s coming,” answered the Very Young Man. 
“He’s got to make it.” 

The Doctor was running towards them now, and in a 
few moments he was beside them, breathing heavily. 

“Close call, Frank,” said the Big Business Man, 
shaking his head. “You were the one said we must keep 
together.” The Doctor was too much out of breath to 
answer. 

“This is worse,” said the Very Young Man. “Look 
where the ring is.” 

More than two hundred yards away across the black 
expanse of silk handkerchief lay the ring. 

“It’s almost as high as our waist now, and look how 
far it is!” added the Very Young Man excitedly. 

“It’s getting farther every minute,” said the Big Busi¬ 
ness Man. “Come on,” and he started to run towards 
the ring. 


iio The Girl in the Golden Atom 

“I can’t make it. It’s too far!” shouted the Doctor 
after him. 

The Big Business Man stopped short. “What’ll we 
do?” he asked. “We’ve got to get there.” 

“That ring will be a mile away in a few minutes, at the 
rate it’s going,” said the Very Young Man. 

“We’ll have to get him to move it over here,” decided 
the Doctor, looking up into the air, and pointing. 

“Gee, I never thought of that!” said the Very Young 
Man. “Oh, great Scott, look at him!” 

Out across the broad expanse of handkerchief they 
could see the huge white face of their friend looming 
four or five hundred feet in the air above them. . It was 
the most astounding sight their eyes had ever beheld; 
yet so confused were they by the flood of new impres- 
sions to which they were being subjected that this colossal 
figure added little to their surprise. 

“We must make him move the ring over here,” re¬ 
peated the Doctor. 

“You’ll never make him hear you,” said the Big Busi¬ 
ness Man, as the Very Young Man began shouting at 
the top of his voice. 

“We’ve got to,” said the Very Young Man breath¬ 
lessly. “Look at that ring. We can’t get to it now. 
We’re stranded here. Good Lord! What’s the matter 
with him—can’t he see us?” he added, and began shout¬ 
ing again. 

“He’s getting up,” said the Doctor. They could see 
the figure of the Banker towering in the air a thousand 
feet above the ring, and then with a swoop of his enor¬ 
mous face come down to them as he knelt upon the floor. 

With his hands to his mouth, the Very Young Man 
shouted up: “It’s too far away. We can’t make it— 



Ill 


Perilous Ways 

we re too small.” They waited. Suddenly, without 
warning, a great wooden oval bowl fifteen or twenty 
feet across came at them with tremendous speed. They 
scattered hastily in terror. 

f *Not that—the ring!” shouted the Very Young Man, 
as he realized it was the spoon in the Banker’s hand that 
had frightened them. 

A moment more and the ring was before them, lying 
at the edge of the handkerchief—a circular pit of rough 
yellow rock breast high. They ran over to it and climbed 
upon its top. 

Another minute and the ring had grown until its top 
became a narrow curving path upon which they could 
stand. They got upon their feet and looked around 
curiously. 

“Well, we’re here,” remarked the Very Young M^n. 
“Everything’s O.K. so far. Let’s get right around after 
that scratch.” 

“Keep together,” cautioned the Doctor, and they 
started off along the path, following its inner edge. 

As they progressed, the top of the ring steadily became 
broader; the surface underfoot became rougher. The 
Big Business Man, walking nearest the edge, pulled his 
companion towards him. “Look there!” he said. They 
stood cautiously at the edge and looked down. 

Beneath them the ring bulged out. Over the bulge 
they could see the black of the handkerchief—a sheer 
hundred-feet drop. The ring curved sharply to the left; 
they could follow its wall all the way around; it formed 
a circular pit some two hundred and fifty feet in diame¬ 
ter. 

A gentle breeze fanned their faces as they walked. The 
Very Young Man looked up into the gray of the distance 



112 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

overhead. A little behind, over his shoulder he saw above 
him in the sky a great, gleaming light many times bigger 
than the sun. It cast on the ground before him an 
opaque shadow, blurred about the edges. 

“Pretty good day, at that,” remarked the Very Young 
Man, throwing out his chest. 

The Doctor laughed. “It’s half-past eight at night,” 
he said. “And if you’ll remember half an hour ago, it’s 
a very stormy night, too.” 

The Big Business Man stopped short in his walk. 
“Just think,” he said pointing up into the gray of the 
sky, with a note of awe in his voice, “over there, not 
more than fifteen feet away, is a window, looking down 
towards the Gaiety Theater and Broadway.” 

The Very Young Man looked bewildered. “That 
window’s a hundred miles away,” he said positively. 

“Fifteen feet,” said the Big Business Man. “Just 
beyond the table.” 

“It’s all in the viewpoint” said the Doctor, and laughed 
again. 

They had recovered their spirits by now, the Very 
Young Man especially seeming imbued with the enthu¬ 
siasm of adventure. 

The path became constantly rougher as they advanced. 

The ground underfoot—a shaggy, yellow, metallic ore 
—was strewn now with pebbles. These pebbles grew 
larger farther on, becoming huge rocks and bowlders 
that greatly impeded their progress. 

They soon found it difficult to follow the brink of the 
precipice. The path had broadened now so that its other 
edge was out of sight, for they could see only a short 
distance amid the bowlders that everywhere tumbled 


Perilotis Ways 113 

about, and after a time they found themselves wandering 
along, lost in the barren waste. 

“How far is the scratch, do you suppose?” the Very 
Young Man wanted to know. 

They stopped and consulted a moment; then the Very 
Young Man clambered up to the top of a rock. “There’s 
a range of hills over there pretty close,” he called down 
to them. “That must be the way.” 

They had just started again in the direction of the hills 
when, almost without warning, and with a great whistle 
and roar, a gale of wind swept down upon them. They 
stood still and looked at each other with startled faces, 
bracing with their feet against its pressure. 

“Oh, golly, what’s this?” cried the Very Young Man, 
and sat down suddenly upon the ground to keep from 
being blown forward. 

The wind increased rapidly in violence until, in a mo¬ 
ment, all three of the men were crouching upon the 
ground for shelter. 

“Great Scott, this is a tornado!” ejaculated the Big 
Business Man. His words were almost lost amid the 
howling of the blast as it swept across the barren waste of 
rocks. 

“Rogers never told us anything about this. It’s get¬ 
ting worse every minute. I-” A shower of pebbles 

and a great cloud of metallic dust swept past, leaving them 
choking and gasping for breath. 

The Very Young Man got upon his hands and knees. 

“I’m going over there,” he panted. “It’s better.” 



CHAPTER XIV 


STRANGE EXPERIENCES 

L ED by the Very Young Man, the three crawled a few 
yards to where a cluster of bowlders promised 
better shelter. Huddled behind this mass of rock, they 
found themselves protected in a measure from the vio¬ 
lence of the storm. Lying there, they could see yellowish- 
gray clouds of sand go sweeping by, with occasionally a 
hail of tiny pebbles, blowing almost horizontal. Over¬ 
head, the sky was unchanged. Not a vestige of cloud 
was visible, only the gray-blue of an immense distance, 
with the huge gleaming light, like an enormous sun, hang- 
in its center. 

The Very Young Man put his hand on the Doctor’s 
arm. “It’s going down,” he said. Hardly were the 
words out of his mouth before, with even less warning 
than it began, the gale abruptly ceased. There remained 
only the pleasantly gentle breeze of a summer afternoon 
blowing against their faces. And this came from almost 
an opposite direction to the storm. 

The three men looked at one another in amazement. 

“Well, I’ll be-” ejaculated the Very Young Man. 

“What next?” 

They waited for some time, afraid to venture out from 
the rocks among which they had taken refuge. Then, de¬ 
ciding that the storm, however unexplainable, was over 
for the time at least, they climbed to their feet and re¬ 
sumed their journey with bruised knees, but otherwise 



Strange Experiences 115 

none the worse for the danger through which they had 
passed. 

After walking a short distance, they came up a little 
incline, and before them, hardly more than a quarter of a 
mile away, they could see a range of hills. 

“The scratch must be behind those hills,” said the Very 
Young Man, pointing. 

“It’s a long distance,” said the Big Business Man 
thoughtfully. “We’re still growing smaller—look.” 

Their minds had been so occupied that for some time 
they had forgotten the effect of the drug upon their 
stature. As they looked about them now they could see 
the rocks around them still increasing steadily in size, and 
could feel the ground shifting under their feet when they 
stood still. 

“You’re right; we're getting smaller,” observed the 
Very Young Man. “How long before we’ll stop, do you 
suppose ?” 

The Doctor drew the Chemist’s memoranda from the 
pouch of his belt. “It says about five or six hours for the 
first four pellets,” he read. 

The Very Young Man looked at his watch. “Quarter 
to nine. We’ve been less than an hour yet. Come on, 
let’s keep going,” and he started walking rapidly for¬ 
ward. 

They walked for a time in silence. The line of hills be¬ 
fore them grew visibly in size, and they seemed slowly to 
be nearing it. 

“I’ve been thinking,” began the Doctor thoughtfully as 
he glanced up at the hills. “There’s one theory of 
Rogers’s that was a fallacy. You remember he was quite 
positive that this change of stature became steadily more 
rapid, until it reached its maximum rate and then re¬ 
mained constant. If that w ? ere so we should probably be 
diminishing in size more rapidly now than when we first 



n 6 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

climbed on to the ring. If we had so much trouble get¬ 
ting to the ring then”—he smiled at the remembrance of 
their difficulty—“I don’t see how we could ever get to 
those hills now.” 

“Gee, that’s so,” said the Very Young Man. “We’d 
never be able to get anywhere, would we?” 

“How do you figure it works?” asked the Big Business 
Man. 

The Doctor folded up the paper and replaced it in his 
belt. “I don’t know,” he answered. “I think probably 
it proceeds in cycles, like the normal rate of growth— 
times of rapid progress succeeded by periods of compara¬ 
tive inactivity.” 

“I never knew people grew that way,” observed the 
Very Young Man. 

“They do,” said the Doctor. “And if these drugs pro¬ 
duce the same effect we-” He got no further, for 

suddenly the earth seemed to rise swiftly under them, and 
they were thrown violently to the ground. 

The Very Young Man, as he lay prone, looked upward, 
and saw the sunlike light above fall swiftly down across 
the sky and disappear below the horizon, plunging the 
world about them into the gloom of a semi-twilight. 
A wind, fiercer than before, swept over them with a 
roar. 

“The end of the world,” murmured the Very Young 
Man to himself. And he wondered why he was not 
frightened. 

Then came the feeling of an extraordinary lightness of 
body, as though the ground were dropping away from 
under him. The wind abruptly ceased blowing. He 
saw the ball of light rise swiftly from the horizon and 
mount upward in a great, gleaming arc to the zenith, 
where again it hung motionless. 

The three men lay quiet, their heads reeling. Then the 



Strange Experiences 117 

Very Young Man sat up dizzily and began feeling him¬ 
self all over. “There’s nothing wrong with me,” he said 
lugubriously, meeting the eyes of his friends who ap¬ 
parently were also more surprised than hurt. “But—oh, 
my gosh, the whole universe went nutty!” he added to 
himself in awe. 

“What did that?” asked the Big Business Man. He 
climbed unsteadily to his feet and sat upon a rock, hold¬ 
ing his head in his hands. 

The Doctor was up in a moment beside him. “We’re 
not hurt,” he said, looking at his companions. “Don’t 
let’s waste any more time—let’s get into that valley.” 
The Very Young Man could see by his manner that he 
knew or guessed what had happened. 

“But say; what-” began the Very Young Man. 

“Come on,” interrupted the Doctor, and started walking 
ahead swiftly. 

There was nothing for his two friends to do but to fol¬ 
low. They walked in silence, in single file, picking their 
way among the rocks. For a quarter of an hour or 
more they kept going, until finally they came to the ridge 
of hills, finding them enormous rocks, several hundred 
feet high, strewn closely together. 

“The valley must be right beyond,” said the Doctor. 
“Come on.” 

The spaces between these huge rocks were, some of 
them, fifty feet or more in width. Inside the hills the 
travelers found the ground even rougher than before, 
and it was nearly half an hour before they emerged on 
the other side. 

Instead of the shallow valley they expected to find, they 
came upon a precipice—a sheer drop into a tremendous 
canon, half as wide possibly as it was deep. They could 
see down to its bottom from where they stood—the same 
rocky, barren waste as that through which they had been 




n 8 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

traveling. Across the canon, on the farther side, lay 
another line of hills. 

"It’s the scratch all right,’ ’ said the Very Young Man, 
as they stopped near the brink of the precipice, “but, holy 
smoke! Isn’t it big?” 

“That’s two thousand feet down there,” said the Big 
Business Man, stepping cautiously nearer to the edge. 
“Rogers didn’t say it was so deep.” 

“That’s because we’ve been so much longer getting 
here,” explained the Doctor. 

“How are we going to get down?” asked the Very 
Young Man as he stood beside the Big Business Man 
within a few feet, of the brink. “It’s getting deeper every 
minute, don’t forget that.” 

The Big Business Man knelt down and carefully ap¬ 
proached to the very edge of the precipice. Then, as he 
looked over, he got upon his feet with a laugh of relief. 
“Come here,” he said. 

They joined him at the edge and, looking over, could 
see that the jagged roughness of the wall made the de¬ 
scent, though difficult, not exceptionally hazardous. Be¬ 
low them, not more than twenty feet, a wide ledge jutted 
out, and beyond that they could see other similar ledges 
and crevices that would afford a foothold. 

“We can get down that,” said the Very Young Man. 
“There’s an easy place,” and he pointed farther along the 
brink, to where a break in the edge seemed to offer a 
means of descent to the ledge just below. 

“It’s going to be a mighty long climb down,” said the 
Big Business Man. “Especially as we’re getting smaller 
all the time. I wonder,” he added thoughtfully, “how 
would it be if we made ourselves larger before we started. 
We could get big enough, you know, so that it would only 
be a few hundred feet down there. Then, after we got 
down, we could get small again.” 


Strange Experiences 119 

“That's a thought/’ said the Very Young Man. 

The Doctor sat down somewhat wearily, and again took 
the papers from his belt. “The idea is a good one,” he 
said. “But there’s one thing you overlook. The larger 
we get, the smoother the wall is going to be. Look, can’t 
you see it changing every moment?” 

It was true. Even in the short time since they had 
first looked down, new crevices had opened up. The de¬ 
scent, though longer, was momentarily becoming less dan¬ 
gerous. 

“You see,” continued the Doctor, “if the valley 
were only a few hundred feet deep, the precipice might 
then be so sheer we could not trust ourselves to it at 
all.” 

“You’re right,” observed the Big Business Man. 

“Well, it’s not very hard to get down now,” said the 
Very Young Man. “Let’s get going before it gets any 
deeper. Say,” he added, “how about stopping our size 
where it is? How would that work?” 

The Doctor was reading the papers he held in his hand. 
“I think,” he said, “it would be our wisest course to fol¬ 
low as closely as possible what Rogers tells us to do. It 
may be harder, but I think we will avoid trouble in the 
end.” 

“We could get lost in size just as easily as in space, 
couldn’t we?” the Big Business Man put in. “That’s a 
curious idea, isn’t it?” 

“It’s true,” agreed the Doctor. “It is something we 
must guard against very carefully.” 

“Well, come on then, let’s get going,” said the Very 
Young Man, pulling the Doctor to his feet. 

The Big Business Man glanced at his watch. “Twenty 
to ten,” he said. Then he looked up into the sky. “One 
hour and a half ago,” he added sentimentally, “we were 
up there. What will another hour bring—I wonder?” 


120 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

“Nothing at all,” said the Very Young Man, “if w? 
don’t ever get started. Come on.” 

He walked towards the place he had selected, followed 
by his companions. And thus the three adventurers be¬ 
gan their descent into the ring. 


CHAPTER XV 


THE VALLEY OF THE SCRATCH 

F OR the first half-hour of their climb down into the 
valley of the scratch, the three friends were too pre¬ 
occupied with their own safety to talk more than an oc¬ 
casional sentence. They came upon many places that at 
first glance appeared impassable, or at least sufficiently 
hazardous to cause them to hesitate, but in each instance 
the changing contour of the precipice offered some other 
means of descent. 

After thirty minutes of arduous effort, the Big Busi¬ 
ness Man sat down suddenly upon a rock and began to 
unlace his shoes. 

“I’ve got to rest a while,” he groaned. “My feet are 
in terrible shape.” 

His two companions were glad of the opportunity to 
sit with him for a moment. 

“Gosh, I’m all in, too!” said the Very Young Man with 
a sigh. 

They were sitting upon a ledge about twenty feet wide, 
with the wall down which they had come at their back. 

“Til swear that’s as far down there as it ever was,” said 
the Big Business Man, with a wave of his hand towards 
the valley below them. 

“Further,” remarked the Very Young Man. “I’ve 
known that right along.” 

“That’s to be expected,” said the Doctor. “But we’re 
a third the way down, just the same; that’s the main 

thing.” He glanced up the rocky, precipitous wall be- 

121 


122 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

hind them. “We’ve come down a thousand feet, at least. 
The valley must be three thousand feet deep or more 
now.” 

“Say, how deep does it get before it stops?” inquired 
the Very Young Man. 

The Doctor smiled at him quietly. “Rogers’s note put 
it about twelve thousand,” he answered. “It should reach 
that depth and stop about”—he hesitated a moment, cal¬ 
culating—“about two o’clock,” he finished. 

“Some climb,” commented the Very Young Man. “We 
could do this a lot better than we’re doing it, I think.” 

For some time they sat in silence. From where they 
sat the valley had all the appearance of a rocky, barren 
canon of their own world above, as it might have looked 
on the late afternoon of a cloudless summer day. A 
gentle breeze was blowing, and in the sky overhead they 
could still see the huge light that for them was the sun. 

“The weather is certainly great down here anyway,” 
observed the Very Young Man, “that’s one consolation.” 

The Rig Business Man had replaced his shoes, taken a 
swallow of water, and risen to his feet, preparing to start 
downward again, when suddenly they all noticed a curious 
swaying motion, as though the earth were moving under 
them. 

“Now what?” ejaculated the Very Young Man, stand¬ 
ing up abruptly, with his feet spread wide apart. 

The ground seemed pressing against his feet as if he 
were weighted down with a heavy load. And he felt a 
little also as though in a moving train with a side thrust 
to guard against. The sun was no longer visible, and the 
valley was plunged in the semidarkness of twilight. A 
strong wind sprang up, sweeping down upon them from 
above. 

The Very Young Man and the Big Business Man 



The Valley of the Scratch 123 

looked puzzled; the Doctor alone of the three seemed to 
understand what was happening. 

‘‘He’s moving the ring/’ he explained, with a note of 
apprehension in his voice. 

“Oh,” ejaculated the Big Business Man, comprehend¬ 
ing at last, “so that’s the-” 

The Very Young Man standing with his back to the 
wall and his legs spread wide looked hastily at his watch. 
“Moving the ring? Why, damn it-” he began im¬ 

petuously. 

The Big Business Man interrupted him. “Look there, 
look!” he almost whispered, awestruck. 

The sky above the valley suddenly had become suffused 
with red. As they watched it seemed to take form, ap¬ 
pearing no longer space, but filled with some enormous 
body of reddish color. In one place they could see it 
broken into a line of gray, and underneath the gray, two 
circular holes of light gleamed down at them. 

The Doctor shuddered and closed his eyes; his two 
friends stared upward, fascinated into immobility. 

“What—is—that?” the Very Young Man whispered. 

Before he could be answered, the earth swayed under 
them more violently than before. The red faded back out 
of the sky, and the sun appeared sweeping up into the 
zenith, where it hung swaying a moment and then poised 
motionless. The valley was flooded again with light; the 
ground steadied under them and became quiet. The wind 
died rapidly away, and in another moment it was as 
though nothing unusual had occurred. 

For a time the three friends stood silent, too astonished 
for words at this extraordinary experience. The Doc¬ 
tor was the first to recover himself. “He moved the 
ring,” he said hurriedly. “That’s twice. We must 
hurry.” 




124 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

“It’s only quarter past ten. We told him not till 
eleven,” protested the Very Young Man. 

“Even that is too soon for safety,” said the Doctor 
back over his shoulder, for already he had started down¬ 
ward. 

It was nearly twelve o’clock when they stopped again 
for rest. At this time the valley appeared about seven or 
eight thousand feet deep: they estimated themselves to be 
slightly more than half-way down. From eleven until 
twelve they had momentarily expected some disturbing 
phenomena attendant upon the removal of the ring by the 
Banker from the clubroom to its place in the Museum. 
But nothing unusual had occurred. 

“He probably decided to leave it alone for a while,” 
commented the Big Business Man, as they were discussing 
the matter. “Glad he showed that much sense.” 

“It would not bother us much now,” the Doctor re¬ 
plied. “We’re too far down. See how the light is 
changing.” 

The sky showed now only as a narrow ribbon of blue 
between the edges of the canon’s walls. The sun 
was behind the wall down which they were climbing, 
out of sight, and throwing their side of the valley 
into shadow. And already they could begin to see a 
dim phosphorescence glowing from the rocks near at 
hand. 

The Very Young Man, sitting beside the Doctor, sud¬ 
denly gripped his friend by the arm. “A bird,” he said, 
pointing down the valley. “See it there?” 

From far off they could see a bird coming up the center 
of the valley at a height apparently almost level with their 
own position, and flying towards them. They watched it 
in silence as it rapidly approached. 

“Great Scott, it’s big!” muttered the Big Business Man 
in an undertone. 


The Valley of the Scratch 125 

As the bird came closer they saw it was fully fifty feet 
across the wings. It was flying straight down the valley 
at tremendous speed. When it was nearly opposite them 
they heard a familiar “cheep, cheep,'’ come echoing across 
the valley. 

“The sparrow,” whispered the Very Young Man. 
“Oh, my gosh, look how big it is!” 

In another moment it had passed them; they watched 
in silence until it disappeared in the distance. 

“Well,” said the Very Young Man, “if that had ever 

seen us-” He drew a long breath, leaving the rest 

to the imagination of his hearers. 

“What a wonderful thing!” said the Big Business Man, 
with a note of awe in his voice. “Just think—that spar¬ 
row when we last saw it was infinitesimally small.” 

The Doctor laughed. “It’s far smaller now than it was 
then,” he said. “Only since we last saw it we have 
changed size to a much greater extent than it has.” 

“Foolish of us to have sent it in here,” remarked the 

Big Business Man casually. “Suppose that-” He 

stopped abruptly. 

The Very Young Man started hastily to his feet. 

“Oh, golly!” he exclaimed as the same thought oc¬ 
curred to him. “That lizard-” Fie looked about 

him wildly. 

“It was foolish perhaps.” The Doctor spoke quietly. 
“But we can't help it now. The sparrow has gone. That 
lizard may be right here at our feet”—The Very Young 
Man jumped involuntarily—-“and so small we can’t see 
it,” the Doctor finished with a smile. “Or it may be a 
hundred miles away and big as a dinosaur.” The Very 
Young Man shuddered. 

“It was senseless of us to let them get in here anyway,” 
said the Big Business Man. “That sparrow evidently has 
stepped getting smaller. Do you realize how big it will 





126 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

be to us, after we’ve diminished a few hundred more 
times?” 

“We needn’t worry over it,” said the Doctor. “Even * 
if we knew the lizard got into the valley the chances of 
our seeing it here are one in a million. But we don't 
even know that. If you’ll remember it was still some 
distance away from the scratch when it became invisible; 

I doubt very much if it even got there. No, I think prob¬ 
ably we’ll never see it again.” 

“I hope not,” declared the Very Young Man emphati¬ 
cally. 

For another hour they climbed steadily downward, 
making more rapid progress than before, for the descent 
became constantly less difficult. During this time they 
spoke little, but it was evident that the Very Young Man, 
from the frequent glances he threw around, never for a 
moment forgot the possibility of encountering the lizard. 
The sparrow did not return, although for that, too, they 
were constantly on the look-out. 

It was nearly half-past one when the Big Business Man 
threw himself upon the ground exhausted. The valley 
at this time had reached a depth of over ten thousand 
feet. It was still growing deeper, but the travelers had 
made good progress and were not more than fifteen hun¬ 
dred feet above its bottom. 

They had been under tremendous physical exertion for 
over five hours, too absorbed in their strange experiences 
to think of eating, and now all three agreed it was foolish 
to attempt to travel farther without food and rest. 

“We had better wait here an hour or two,” the Doctor 
decided. “Our size will soon remain constant and it 
won’t take us long to get down after we’ve rested.” 

“I’m hungry,” suggested the Very Young Man, “how 
about you?” 

They ate and drank sparingly of the little store they 


The Valley of the Scratch 127 

had brought with them. The Doctor would not let them 
have much, both because he wanted to conserve their sup- 
p!y> and because he knew in their exhausted condition it 
would be bad for them to eat heartily. 

It was about two o’clock when they noticed that ob¬ 
jects around them no longer were increasing in size. 
They had finished their meal and felt greatly refreshed. 

“Things have stopped growing,” observed the Very 
Young Man. “We’ve done four pills’ worth of the jour¬ 
ney anyway,” he added facetiously. He rose to his 
feet, stretching. He felt sore and bruised all over, 
but with the meal and a little rest, not particularly 
tired. * 

“I move we go on down now,” he suggested, walking 
to the edge of the huge crevice in which they were sitting. 
“It’s only a couple of thousand feet.” 

“Perhaps we might as well,” agreed the Doctor, rising 
also. “When we get to the floor of the valley, we can 
find a good spot and turn in for the night.” 

The incongruity of his last words with the scene around 
made the Doctor smile. Overhead the sky still showed a 
narrow ribbon of blue. Across the valley the sunlight 
sparkled on the yellowish crags of the rocky wall. In 
the shadow, on the side down which they were climbing, 
the rocks now shone distinctly phosphorescent, with a 
peculiar waviness of outline. 

“Not much like either night or day, is it?” added the 
Doctor. “We’ll have to get used to that.” 

They started off again, and in another two hours found 
themselves going down a gentle rocky slope and out upon 
the floor of the valley. 

“We’re here at last,” said the Big Business Man 
wearily. 

The Very Young Man looked up the great, jagged prec¬ 
ipice down which they had come, to where, far above, its 


128 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

edge against the strip of blue marked the surface of the 
ring. 

“Some trip/’ he remarked. “I wouldn't want to tackle 
that every day.” 

“Four o’clock,” said the Doctor, “the light up there 
looks just the same. I wonder what’s happened to 
George.” 

Neither of his companions answered him. The Big 
Business Man lay stretched full length upon the ground 
near by, and the Very Young Man still stood looking up 
the precipice, lost in thought. 

“What a nice climb going back,” he suddenly remarked. 

The Doctor laughed. “Don't let’s worry about that, 
Jack. If you remember how Rogers described it, getting 
back is easier than getting in. But the main point now,” 
he added seriously, “is for us to make sure of getting 
down to Arite as speedily as possible.” 

The Very Young Man surveyed the barren waste 
around them in dismay. The floor of the valley was 
strewn with even larger rocks and bowlders than those on 
the surface above, and looked utterly pathless and deso¬ 
late. “What do we do first?” he asked dubiously. 

“First,” said the Doctor, smiling at the Big Business 
Man, who lay upon his back staring up into the sky and 
paying no attention to them whatever, “I think first we 
had better settle ourselves for a good long rest here.” 

“If we stop at all, let’s sleep a while,” said the Very 
Young Man. “A little rest only gets you stiff. It's a 
pretty exposed place out here though, isn’t it, to sleep?” 
he added, thinking of the sparrow and the lizard. 

“One of us will stay awake and watch,” answered the 
Doctor. 


CHAPTER XVI 


THE PIT OF DARKNESS 

A T the suggestion of the Very Young Man they lo¬ 
cated without much difficulty a sort of cave amid 
the -rocks, which offered shelter for their rest. Taking 
turns watching, they passed eight hours in fair comfort, 
and by noon next day, after another frugal meal they felt 
thoroughly refreshed and eager to continue the journey. 

“We sure are doing this classy/’ observed the Very 
Young Man. “Think of Rogers—all he could do w^as 
fall asleep when he couldn’t stay awake any more. Gosh, 
what chances he took!” 

“W r e’re playing it safe,” agreed the Big Business Man. 
“But w r e mustn’t take it too easy,” added the Doctor. 
The Very Young Man stretched himself luxuriously 
and buckled his belt on tighter. “Well, I’m ready for 
anything,” he announced. “What’s next?” 

The Doctor consulted his papers. “We find the circu¬ 
lar pit Rogers made in the scratch and we descend into it. 
We take twelve more pills at the edge of the pit,” he said. 

The Very Young Man leaped to the top of a rock and 
looked out over the desolate waste helplessly. “How 
are we going to find the pit?” he asked dubiously. “It’s 
not in sight, that’s sure.” 

“It’s down there—about five miles,” said the Doctor. 
“I saw it yesterday as we came down.” 

“That’s easy,” said the Very Young Man, and he 
started off enthusiastically, followed by the others. 

In less than two hours they found themselves at the 


130 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

edge of the pit. It appeared almost circular in form, ap¬ 
parently about five miles across, and its smooth, shining 
walls extended almost perpendicularly down into black¬ 
ness. Somewhat awed by the task confronting them in 
getting down into this abyss, the three friends sat down 
near its brink to discuss their plan of action. 

“We take twelve pills here,” said the Doctor. “That 
ought to make us small enough to climb down into that.” 

“Do you think we need so many?” asked the Big Busi¬ 
ness Man thoughtfully. “You know, Frank, we’re mak¬ 
ing an awful lot of work for ourselves, playing this thing 
so absolutely safe. Think of what a distance down that 
will be after we have got as small as twelve pills will make 
us. It might take us days to get to the bottom.” 

“How did Rogers get down?” the Very Young Man 
wanted to know. 

“He took the twelve pills here,” the Doctor answered. 

“But as I understand it, he fell most of the way down 
while he was still big, and then got small afterwards at 
the bottom.” This from the Big Business Man. 

“I don’t know how about you,” said the Very Young 
Man drily, “but I’d much rather take three days to walk 
down than fall down in one day.” 

The Doctor smiled. “I still think,” he said, “that we 
had better stick to the directions Rogers left us. Then 
at least there is no danger of our getting lost in size. But 
I agree with you, Jack. I’d rather not fall down, even if 
it takes longer to walk.” 

“I wonder-” began the Big Business Man. “You 

know I’ve been thinking—it does seem an awful waste of 
energy for us to let ourselves get smaller than absolutely 
necessary in climbing down these places. Maybe you 
don’t realize it.” 

“I do,” said the Very Young Man, looking sorrowfully 



The Pit of Darkness 131 

at the ragged shoes on his feet and the cuts and bruises on 
his legs. 

“What I mean is-“ persisted the Big Business Man. 

“How far do you suppose we have actually traveled since 
we started last night?” 

“That's pretty hard to estimate,” said the doctor. “We 
have walked perhaps fifteen miles altogether, besides the 
climb down. I suppose we actually came down five or 
six thousand feet.” 

“And at the size we are now it would have been twelve 
thousand feet down, wouldn’t it?” 

“Yes,” answered the Doctor, “it would.” 

“And just think,” went on the Big Business Man, 
“right now, based on the size we were when we began, 
we’ve only gone some six feet altogether from the place 
we started.” 

“And a sixteenth of an inch or less since we left the 
surface of the ring,” said the Doctor smiling. 

“Gee, that’s a weird thought,” the Very Young Man 
said, as he gazed in awe at the lofty heights about them. 

“I’ve been thinking,” continued the Big Business Man. 
“You say we must be careful not to get lost in size. 
Well, suppose instead of taking twelve pills here, we only 
take six. That should be enough to get us started—pos¬ 
sibly enough to get us all the way down. Then before 
we moved at all we could take the other six. That would 
keep it straight, wouldn’t it?” 

“Great idea,” said the Very Young Man. “I’m in 
favor of that.” 

“It sounds feasible—certainly if we can get all the way 
down with six pills we will save a lot of climbing.” 

“If six aren’t enough, we can easily take more,” added 
the Big Business Man. 

And so they decided to take only six pills of the drug 




132 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

and to get down to the bottom of the pit, if possible, with¬ 
out taking more. The pit, as they stood looking down 
into it now, seemed quite impossible of descent, for its al¬ 
most perpendicular wall was smooth and shining as pol¬ 
ished brass. 

They took the drug, standing close together at the 
edge of the pit. Immediately began again the same crawl¬ 
ing sensation underfoot, much more rapid this time, while 
all around them the rocks began very rapidly increasing in 
size. 

The pit now seemed widening out at an astounding rate. 
In a few minutes it had broadened so that its opposite side 
could not be seen. The wall at the brink of which they 
stood had before curved in a great sweeping arc to en¬ 
close the circular hole; now it stretched in a nearly 
straight, unbroken line to the right and left as far as they 
could see. Beneath them lay only blackness; it was as 
though they were at the edge of the world. 

“Good God, what a place to go down into,” gasped the 
Big Business Man, after they had been standing nearly 
half an hour in silence, appalled at the tremendous changes 
taking place around them. 

For some time past the wall before them had become 
sufficiently indented and broken to make possible their 
descent. It was the Doctor who first realized the time— 
or perhaps it should be said, the size—they were losing 
by their inactivity; and when with a few crisp words he 
brought them to themselves, they immediately started 
downward. 

For another six hours they traveled downward stead¬ 
ily, stopping only once to eat. The descent during this 
time was not unlike that down the side of the valley, al¬ 
though towards the last it began rapidly to grow less pre¬ 
cipitous. 

They now found themselves confronted frequently with 


The Pit of Darkness 133 

gentle slopes downward, half a mile or more in extent, 
and sometimes by almost level places, succeeded by an¬ 
other sharp descent. 

During this part of the trip they made more rapid 
progress than at any time since starting, the Very Young 
Man in his enthusiasm at times running forward and then 
sitting down to wait for the others to overtake him. 

The light overhead gradually faded into the character¬ 
istic luminous blackness the Chemist had described. As it 
did so, the phosphorescent quality of the rocks greatly in¬ 
creased, or at least became more noticeable, so that the 
light illuminating the landscape became hardly less in 
volume, although totally different in quality. 

The ground underfoot and the rocks themselves had 
been steadily changing. They had lost now almost en¬ 
tirely the yellowishness, metal look, and seemed to have 
more the quality of a gray opaque glass, or marble. They 
appeared rather smoother, too, than before, although the 
huge bowlders and loosely strewn rocks and pebbles still 
remained the characteristic feature of the landscape. 

The three men were still diminishing in size; in fact, at 
this time the last dose of the drug seemed to have at¬ 
tained its maximum power, for objects around them ap¬ 
peared to be growing larger at a dizzying rate. They 
were getting used to this effect, however, to a great ex¬ 
tent, and were no longer confused by the change as they 
had been before. 

It was the Big Business Man who first showed signs 
of weakening, and at the end of six hours or more of 
steady—and, towards the end, extremely rapid—traveling 
he finally threw himself down and declared he could go no 
farther. At this point they rested again several hours, 
taking turns at watch, and each of them getting some 
measure of sleep. Of the three, the Very Young Man 
appeared in the best condition, although possibly it was 


134 


The Girl in the Golden Atom 


his enthusiasm that kept him from admitting even to 
himself any serious physical distress. 

It was perhaps ten or twelve hours after they had taken 
the six pills that they were again ready to start downward. 
Before starting the three adventurers discussed earnestly 
the advisability of taking the other six pills. The action 
of the drug had ceased some time before. They decided 
not to, since apparently there was no difficulty facing 
them at this part of the journey, and decreasing their 
stature would only immeasurably lengthen the distance 
they had to go. 

They had been traveling downward, through a barren 
land that now showed little change of aspect, for hardly 
more than another hour, when suddenly, without warn¬ 
ing, they came upon the tremendous glossy incline that 
they had been expecting to reach for some time. The 
rocks and bowlders stopped abruptly, and they found at 
their feet, sloping downward at an angle of nearly forty- 
five degrees, a great, smooth plane. It extended as far 
as they could see both to the right and left and downward, 
at a slightly lessening angle, into the luminous darkness 
that now bounded their entire range of vision in every 
direction. 

This plane seemed distinctly of a different substance 
than anything they had hitherto encountered. It was, as 
the Chemist had described it, apparently like a smooth 
black marble. Yet it was not so smooth to them now as 
he had pictured it, for its surface was sufficiently indented 
and ridged to afford foothold. 

They started down this plane gingerly, yet with an as¬ 
sumed boldness they were all of them far from feeling. 
It was slow work at first, and occasionally one or the 
other of them would slide headlong a score of feet, until 
a break in the smoothness brought him to a stop. Their 
rubber-soled shoes stood them in good stead here, for 


The Pit of Darkness 135 

without the aid given by them this part of the journey 
would have been impossible. 

For several hours they continued this form of descent. 
The incline grew constantly less steep, until finally they 
were able to walk down it quite comfortably. They 
stopped again to eat, and after traveling what seemed 
to them some fifteen miles from the top of the incline 
they finally reached its bottom. 

They seemed now to be upon a level floor—a ground of 
somewhat metallic quality such as they had become fa¬ 
miliar with above. Only now there were no rocks or 
bowlders, and the ground was smoother and with a pecul¬ 
iar corrugation. On one side lay the incline down which 
they had come. There was nothing but darkness to be 
seen in any other direction. Here they stopped again to 
rest and recuperate, and then they discussed earnestly 
their next movements. 

The Doctor, seated wearily upon the ground, consulted 
his memoranda earnestly. The Very Young Man sat 
close beside him. As usual the Big Business Man lay 
prone upon his back near-by, waiting for their decision. 

“Rogers wasn’t far from a forest when he got here,’’ 
said the Very Young Man, looking sidewise at the papers 
in the Doctor’s hand. “And he speaks of a tiny range of 
hills; but we can’t see anything from here.’’ 

“We may not be within many miles of where Rogers 
landed,” answered the Doctor. 

“No reason why we should be, at that, is there? Do 
you think we’ll ever find Arite?” 

“Don’t overlook the fact we’ve got six more pills to 
take here,” called the Big Business Man. 

“That’s just what I was considering,” said the Doctor 
thoughtfully. “There’s no use our doing anything until 
we have attained the right size. Those hills and the 
forest and river we are looking for might be here right 


136 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

at our feet and we couldn’t see them while we are as big 
as this.” 

“We’d better take the pills and stay right here until 
their action wears off. I’m going to take a sleep,” said 
the Big Business Man. 

“I think we might as well all sleep,” said the Doctor. 
“There could not possibly be anything here to harm us.” 

They each took the six additional pills without further 
words. Physically exhausted as they were, and with the 
artificial drowsiness produced by the drug, they were all 
three in a few moments fast asleep. 


rH' 


CHAPTER XVII 


THE WELCOME OF THE MASTER 

I T was nearly twelve hours later, as their watches 
showed them, that the first of the weary adventurers 
awoke. The Very Young Man it was who first opened 
his eyes with a confused sense of feeling that he was in 
bed at home, and that this was the momentous day he 
was to start his journey into the ring. He sat up and 
rubbed his eyes vigorously to see more clearly his sur¬ 
roundings. 

Beside him lay his two friends, fast asleep. With re¬ 
turning consciousness came the memory of the events of 
the day and night before. The Very Young Man sprang 
to his feet and vigorously awoke his companions. 

The action of the drug again had ceased, and at first 
glance the scene seemed to have changed very little. The 
incline now was some distance away, although still visible, 
stretching up in a great arc and fading away into the 
blackness above. The ground beneath their feet still of 
its metallic quality, appeared far rougher than before. 
The Very Young Man bent down and put his hand upon 
it. There was some form of vegetation there, and, lean¬ 
ing closer, he could see what appeared to be the ruins of a 
tiny forest, bent and trampled, the tree-trunks no larger 
than slender twigs that he could have snapped asunder 
easily between his fingers. 

“Look at this,” he exclaimed. “The woods—we’re 
here.” 

The others knelt down with him. 

i37 


138 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

“Be careful,” cautioned the Doctor. “Don’t move 
around. We must get smaller." He drew the papers 
from his pocket. 

“Rogers was in doubt about this quantity to take,” he 
added. “We should be now somewhere at the edge or in 
the forest he mentions. Yet we may be very far from the 
point at which he reached the bottom of that incline. I 
think, too, that we are somewhat larger than he was. 
Probably the strength of our drug differs from his to 
some extent.” 

“How much should we take next, I wonder?” said the 
Big Business Man as he looked at his companions. 

The Doctor took a pill and crushed it in his hand. “Let 
11s take so much,” he said, indicating a small portion of 
the powder. The others each crushed one of the pills 
and endeavored to take as nearly as possible an equal 
amount. 

“I’m hungry,” said the Very Young Man. “Can we 
eat right after the powder?” 

“I don’t think that should make any difference,” the 
Doctor answered, and so accustomed to the drug were 
they now that, quite nonchalantly, they sat down and ate. 

After a few moments it became evident that in spite of 
their care the amounts of the drug they had taken were 
far from equal. 

Before they had half finished eating, the Very Young 
Man was hardly more than a third the size of the Doctor, 
with the Big Business Man about half-way between. 
This predicament suddenly struck them as funny, and all 
three laughed heartily at the effect of the drug. 

“Hey, you, hurry up, or you'll never catch me,” shouted 
the Very Young Man gleefully. “Gosh, but you’re big!” 
He reached up and tried to touch the Doctor’s shoulder. 
Then, seeing the huge piece of chocolate in his friend’s 
hand and comparing it with the little one in his own, he 


The Welcome of the Master 139 

added: “Trade you chocolate. That’s a regular meal 
you got there.” 

“That’s a real idea,” said the Big Business Man, ceas¬ 
ing his laughter abruptly. “Do you know, if we ever get 
really low on food, all we have to do is one of us stay big 
and his food would last the other two a month.” 

“Fine; but how about the big one?” asked the Very 
Young Man, grinning. “He’d starve to death on that 
plan, wouldn’t he?” 

“Well, then he could get much smaller than the other 
two, and they could feed him. It’s rather involved, I’ll 
admit, but you know what I mean,” the Big Business Man 
finished somewhat lamely. 

“I’ve got a much better scheme than that,” said the 
Very Young Man. “You let the food stay large and you 
get small. How about that?” he added triumphantly. 
Then he laid carefully on the ground beside him a bit ot 
chocolate and a few of the hard crackers they were eat¬ 
ing. “Stay there, little friends, when you grow up, I’ll 
take you back,” he added in a gleeful tone of voice. 

“Strange that should never have occurred to us,” said 
the Doctor. “It’s a perfect way of replenishing our food 
supply,” and quite seriously both he and the Big Business 
Man laid aside some of their food. 

“Thank me for that brilliant idea,” said the Very 
Young Man. Then, as another thought occurred to him, 
he scratched his head lugubriously. “Wouldn’t work 
very well if we were getting bigger, would it? Don’t 
let’s ever get separated from any food coming out.” 

The Doctor was gigantic now in proportion to the other 
two, and both he and the Big Business Man took a very 
small quantity more of the drug in an effort to equalize 
their rate of bodily reduction. They evidently hit it about 
right, for no further change in their relative size occurred. 

All this time the vegetation underneath them had been 


140 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

growing steadily larger. From tiny broken twigs it grew 
to sticks bigger than their fingers, then to the thickness of 
their arms. They moved slightly from time to time, let¬ 
ting it spread out from under them, or brushing it aside 
and clearing a space in which they could sit more com¬ 
fortably. Still larger it grew until the tree-trunks, thick 
now almost as their bodies, were lying broken and twisted, 
all about them. Over to one side thev could see, half a 
mile away, a place where the trees were still standing— 
slender saplings, they seemed, growing densely together. 

In half an hour more the Very Young Man announced 
he had stopped getting smaller. The action of the drug 
ceased in the others a few minutes later. They were still 
not quite in their relative sizes, but a few grains of the 
powder quickly adjusted that. 

They now found themselves near the edge of what once 
was a great forest. Huge trees, whose trunks measured 
six feet or more in diameter, lay scattered about upon the 
ground; not a single one was left standing. In the dis¬ 
tance they could see, some miles away, where the untrod¬ 
den forest began. 

They had replaced the food in their belts some time be¬ 
fore, and now again they were ready to start. Suddenly 
the Very Young Man spied a huge, round, whitish-brown 
object lying beside a tree-trunk near by. He went over 
and stood beside it. Then he called his friends excitedly. 
It was irregularly spherical in shape and stood higher than 
his knees—a great jagged ball. The Very Young Man 
bent down, broke of! a piece of the ball, and, stuffing it 
into his mouth, began chewing with enthusiasm. 

“Now, what do you think of that?” he remarked with 
a grin. “A cracker crumb I must have dropped when 
we first began lunch!” 

They decided now to make for the nearest part of the 
unbroken forest. It was two hours before they reached 


The Welcome of the Master 141 

it, for among the tangled mass of broken, fallen trees 
their progress was extremely difficult and slow. Once in¬ 
side, among the standing trees, they felt more lost than 
ever. They had followed implicitly the Chemist’s direc¬ 
tions, and in general had encountered the sort of country 
they expected. Nevertheless, they all three realized that 
it was probable the route they had followed coming in was 
quite different from that taken by the Chemist; and in 
what direction lay their destination, and how far, they 
had not even the vaguest idea, but they were determined 
to go on. 

“If ever we find this city of Arite, it’ll be a miracle 
sure,” the Very Young Man remarked as they were 
walking along in silence. 

They had gone only a short distance farther when the 
Big Business Man, who was walking in front, stopped 
abruptly. 

“What’s that?” he asked in a startled undertone. 

They followed the direction of his hand, and saw, 
standing rigid against a tree-trunk ahead, the figure of a 
man little more than half as tall as themselves, his grayish 
body very nearly the color of the blue-gray tree behind 
him. 

The three adventurers stood motionless, staring in 
amazement. 

As the Big Business Man spoke, the little figure, which 
had evidently been watching them for some time, turned 
irresolutely as though about to run. Then with gather¬ 
ing courage it began walking slowly towards them, hold¬ 
ing out its arms with the palm up. 

“He’s friendly,” whispered the Very Young Man; and 
they waited, silent, as the man approached. 

As he came closer, they could see he was hardly more 
than a boy, perhaps twenty years of age. His lean, gray 
body was nearly naked. Around his waist he wore a 


142 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

drab-colored tunic, of a substance they could not identify. 
His feet and legs were bare. On his chest were strapped 
a thin stone plate, slightly convex. His thick, wavy, black 
hair, cut at the base of his neck, hung close about his ears. 
His head was uncovered. His features were regular and 
pleasing; his smile showed an even row of very white 
teeth. 

The three men did not speak or move until, in a mo¬ 
ment, more, he stood directly before them, still holding 
out his hands palm up. Then abruptly he spoke. 

“The Master welcomes his friends,” he said in a soft 
musical voice. He gave the words a most curious accent 
and inflexion, yet they were quite understandable to his 
listeners. 

“The Master welcomes his friends,” he repeated, drop¬ 
ping his arms to his sides and smiling in a most friendly 
manner. 

The Very Young Man caught his breath. “He’s been 
sent to meet us; he’s from Rogers. What do you think 
of that? We’re all right now!” he exclaimed excitedly. 

The Doctor held out his hand, and the Oroid, hesitating 
a moment in doubt, finally reached up and grasped it. 

“Are you from Rogers ?” asked the Doctor. 

The Oroid looked puzzled. Then he turned and flung 
out his arm in a sweeping gesture towards the deeper 
woods before them. “Rogers—Master,” he said. 

“You were waiting for us?” persisted the Doctor; but 
the other only shook his head and smiled his lack of com¬ 
prehension. 

“He only knows the first words he said,” the Big Busi¬ 
ness Man suggested. 

“He must be from Rogers,” the Very Young Man put 
in. “See, he wants us to go with him.” 

The Oroid was motioning them forward, holding out 
his hand as though to lead them. 


The Welcome of the Master 143 

The Very Young Man started forward, but the Big 
Business Man held him back. 

“Wait a moment,'’ he said. “I don’t think we ought 
to go among these people as large as we are. Rogers is 
evidently alive and waiting for us. Why wouldn’t it be 
better to be about his size, instead of ten-foot giants as 
we would look now ?” 

“How do you know how big Rogers is?” asked the 
Very Young Man. 

“I think that a good idea,” agreed the Doctor. “Rogers 
described these Oroid men as being some six inches 
shorter than himself, on the average.” 

“This one might be a pygmy, for all we know,” said 
the Very Young Man. 

“We might chance it that he’s of normal size,” said 
the Doctor, smiling. “I think we should make ourselves 
smaller.” 

The Oroid stood patiently by and watched them with in¬ 
terested eyes as each took a tiny pellet from a vial un¬ 
der his arm and touched it to his tongue. When they be¬ 
gan to decrease in size his eyes widened with fright and 
his legs shook under him. But he stood his ground, evi¬ 
dently assured by their smiles and friendly gestures. 

In a few minutes the action of the drug was over, and 
they found themselves not more than a head taller than 
the Oroid. In this size he seemed to like them better, or 
at least he stood in far less awe of them, for now he seized 
them by the arms and pulled them forward vigorously. 

They laughingly yielded, and, led by this strange being 
of another world, they turned from the open places they 
had been following and plunged into the depths of the 
forest. 


CHAPTER XVIII 


THE CHEMIST AND HIS SON 

F OR an hour or more the three adventurers followed 
their strange guide in silence through the dense, 
trackless woods. He walked very rapidly, looking 
neither to the right nor to the left, finding his way ap¬ 
parently by an intuitive sense of direction. Occasionally 
he glanced back over his shoulder and smiled. 

Walking through the woods here was not difficult, and 
the party made rapid progress. The huge, upstanding 
tree-trunks were devoid of limbs for a hundred feet or 
more above the ground. On some of them a luxuriant 
vine was growing—a vine that bore a profusion of little 
gray berries. In the branches high overhead a few birds 
flew to and fro, calling out at times with a soft, cooing 
note. The ground—a gray, finely powdered sandy loam 
—was carpeted with bluish fallen leaves, sometimes with 
a species of blue moss, and occasional ferns of a like 
color. 

The forest was dense, deep, and silent; the tree branches 
overhead locked together in a solid canopy, shutting out 
the black sky above. Yet even in this seclusion the scene 
remained as light as it had been outside the woods in the 
open. Darkness indeed was impossible in this land; under 
all circumstances the light seemed the same—neither too 
bright nor too dim—a comfortable, steady glow, restful, 
almost hypnotic in its sameness. 

They had traveled perhaps six miles from the point 

where they met their Oroid guide when suddenly the Very 

144 


The Chemist and his Son 145 

Young Man became aware that other Oroids were with 
them. Looking to one side, he saw two more of these 
strange gray men, silently stalking along, keeping pace 
with them. Turning, he made out still another, follow¬ 
ing a short distance behind. The Very Young Man was 
startled, and hurriedly pointed them out to his com¬ 
panions. 

“Wait,” called the Doctor to their youthful guide, and 
abruptly the party came to a halt. 

By these signs they made their guide understand that 
they wanted these other men to come closer. The Oroid 
shouted to them in his own quaint tongue, words of a 
soft, liquid quality with a wistful sound—words wholly 
unintelligible to the adventurers. 

The men came forward diffidently, six of them, for 
three others appeared out of the shadows of the forest, 
and stood in a group, talking among themselves a little 
and smiling at their visitors. They were all dressed simi¬ 
larly to Lao—for such was the young Oroid’s name—and 
all of them older than he, and of nearly the same height. 

“Do any of you speak English?” asked the Doctor, 
addressing them directly. 

Evidently they did not, for they answered only by shak¬ 
ing their heads and by more smiles. 

Then one of them spoke. “The Master welcomes his 
friends,” he said. And all the others repeated it after 
him, like children in school repeating proudly a lesson 
newly learned. 

The Doctor and his two friends laughed heartily, and, 
completely reassured by this exhibition of their friendli¬ 
ness, they signified to Lao that they were ready again to 
go forward. 

As they walked onward through the apparently end¬ 
less and unchanging forest, surrounded by what the Very 
Young Man called their “guard of honor,” they were 


146 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

joined from time to time by other Oroid men, all of whom 
seemed to know who they were and where they were go¬ 
ing, and who fell silently into line with them. Within an 
hour their party numbered twenty or more. 

Seeing one of the natives stop a moment and snatch 
some berries from one of the vines with which many of 
the trees were encumbered, the Very Young Man did the 
same. He found the berries sweet and palatable, and he 
ate a quantity. Then discovering he was hungry, he took 
some crackers from his belt and ate them walking along. 
The Doctor and the Big Business Man ate also, for al¬ 
though they had not realized it, all three were actually 
famished. 

Shortly after this the party came to a broad, smooth¬ 
flowing river, its banks lined with rushes, with here and 
there a little spot of gray, sandy beach. It was apparent 
from Lao’s signs that they must wait at this point for a 
boat to take them across. This they were glad enough 
to do, for all three had gone nearly to the limit of their 
strength. They drank deep of the pure river water, laved 
their aching limbs in it gratefully, and lay down, caring 
not a bit how long they were forced to wait. 

In perhaps another hour the boat appeared. It came 
from down the river, propelled close inshore by two mem¬ 
bers of their own party who had gone to fetch it. At 
first the travelers thought it a long, oblong raft. Then as 
it came closer they could see it was constructed of three 
canoes, each about thirty feet long, hollowed out of tree- 
trunks. Over these was laid a platform of small trees 
hewn roughly into boards. The boat was propelled by 
long, slender poles in the hands of the two men, who, one 
on each side, dug them into the bed of the river and 
walked with them the length of the platform. 

On to this boat the entire party crowded and they were 
soon well out on the shallow river, headed for its opposite 


The Chemist and his Son 147 

bank. The Very Young Man, seated at the front end of 
the platform with his legs dangling over and his feet only 
a few inches above the silver phosphorescence of the 
rippling water underneath, sighed luxuriously. 

“This beats anything we’ve done yet,” he murmured. 
“Gee, it’s nice here!” 

When they landed on the farther bank another group of 
natives was waiting for them. The party, thus strength¬ 
ened to nearly forty, started oft immediately into the 
forest, which on this side of the river appeared equally 
dense and trackless. 

They appeared now to be paralleling the course of the 
river a few hundred yards back from its bank. After 
half an hour of this traveling they came abruptly to what 
at first appeared to be the mouth of a large cave, but 
which afterwards proved to be a tunnel-like passageway. 
Into this opening the party unhesitatingly plunged. 

Within this tunnel, which sloped downward at a con¬ 
siderable angle, they made even more rapid progress than 
in the forest above. The tunnel walls here were perhaps 
twenty feet apart—walls of a glistening, radiant, crystal¬ 
line rock. The roof of the passageway was fully twice 
as high as its width; its rocky floor was smooth and even. 

After a time this tunnel was crossed by another some¬ 
what broader and higher, but in general of similar aspect. 
It, too, sloped downward, more abruptly from the inter¬ 
section. Into this latter passageway the party turned, 
Still taking the downward course. 

As they progressed, many other passageways were 
crossed, the intersections of which were wide at the open 
spaces. Occasionally the travelers encountered other na¬ 
tives, all of them men, most of whom turned and followed 
them. 

The Big Business Man, after over an hour of this rapid 
walking downward, was again near the limit of his endur- 




i 4 8 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

ance, when the party, after crossing a broad, open square, 
came upon a sort of sleigh, with two animals harnessed 
to it. It was standing at the intersection of a still 
broader, evidently more traveled passageway, and in it 
was an attendant, apparently fast asleep. 

Into this sleigh climbed the three travelers with their 
guide Lao; and, driven by the attendant, they started 
down the broader tunnel at a rapid pace. The sleigh was 
balanced upon a broad single runner of polished stone, 
with a narrow, slightly shorter outrider on each side; it 
slid smoothly and easily on this runner over the equally 
smooth, metallic rock of the ground. 

The reindeer-like animals were harnessed by their heads 
to a single shaft. They were guided by a short, pointed 
pole in the hands of the driver, who, as occasion de¬ 
manded, dug it vigorously into their flanks. 

In this manner the travelers rode perhaps half an hour 
more. The passageway sloped steeply downward, and 
they made good speed. Finally without warning, except 
by a sudden freshening of the air, they emerged into the 
open, and found themselves facing a broad, rolling stretch 
of country, dotted here and there with trees—the country 
of the Oroids at last. 

For the first time since leaving their own world the ad¬ 
venturers found themselves amid surroundings that at 
least held some semblance of an aspect of familiarity. 
The scene they faced now might have been one of their 
own land viewed on an abnormally bright though moon¬ 
less evening. 

For some miles they could see a rolling, open country, 
curving slightly upward into the dimness of the distance. 
At their right, close by, lay a broad lake, its surface 
wrinkled under a gentle breeze and gleaming bright as a 
great sheet of polished silver. 

Overhead hung a gray-blue, cloudless sky, studded with 


The Chemist and his Son 149 

a myriad of faint, twinkling, golden-silver stars. On the 
lake shore lay a collection of houses, close together, at the 
water’s edge and spreading back thinly into the hills be¬ 
hind. This they knew to be Arite—the city of their desti¬ 
nation. 

At the end of the tunnel they left the sleigh, and, turn¬ 
ing down the gentle sloping hillside, leisurely approached 
the city. They were part way across an open field separat¬ 
ing them from the nearest houses, when they saw a group 
of figures coming across the field towards them. This 
group stopped when still a few hundred yards away, only 
two of the figures continuing to come forward. They 
came onward steadily, the tall figure of a man clothed in 
white, and by his side a slender, graceful boy. 

In a moment more Lao, walking in front of the Doctor 
and his two companions, stopped suddenly and, turning 
to face them, said quietly, “'The Master.” 

The three travelers, with their hearts pounding, paused 
an instant. Then with a shout the Very Young Man 
dashed forward, followed by his two companions. 

“It’s Rogers—it’s Rogers !” he called ; and in a moment 
more the three men were beside the Chemist, shaking his 
hand and pouring at him excitedly their words of greeting. 

The Chemist welcomed them heartily, but with a quiet, 
curious air of dignity that they did not remember he pos¬ 
sessed before. He seemed to have aged considerably 
since they had last seen him. The lines in his face had 
deepened; the hair on his temples was white. He seemed 
also to be rather taller than they remembered him, and 
certainly he was stouter. 

He was dressed in a long, flowing robe of white cloth, 
gathered in at the waist by a girdle, from which hung a 
short sword, apparently of gold or of beaten brass. His 
legs were bare; on his feet he wore a form of sandal with 
leather thongs crossing his insteps. His hair grew long 



150 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

over his ears and was cut off at the shoulder line in the 
fashion of the natives. 

When the first words of greeting were over, the Chem¬ 
ist turned to the boy, who was standing apart, watching 
them with big, interested eyes. 

“My friends,” he said quietly, yet with a little under¬ 
lying note of pride in his voice, “this is my son.” 

The boy approached deferentially. He was apparently 
about ten or eleven years of age, tall as his father’s shoul¬ 
der nearly, extremely slight of build, yet with a body per¬ 
fectly proportioned. He was dressed in a white robe 
similar to his father’s, only shorter, ending at his knees. 
His skin was of a curious, smooth, milky whiteness, lack¬ 
ing the gray, harder look of that of the native men, and 
with just a touch of the iridescent quality possessed by the 
women. His features were cast in a delicate mold, 
pretty enough almost to be called girlish, yet with a firm 
squareness of chin distinctly masculine. 

His eyes were blue; his thick, wavy hair, falling to his 
shoulders, was a chestnut brown. His demeanor was 
graceful and dignified, yet with a touch of ingenuousness 
that marked him for the care-free child he really was. He 
held out his hands palms up as he approached. 

“My name is Loto,” he said in a sweet, soft voice, with 
perfect self-possession. “I’m glad to meet my father’s 
friends.” He spoke English with just a trace of the 
liquid quality that characterized his mother’s tongue. 

“You are late getting here,” remarked the Chemist with 
a smile, as the three travelers, completely surprised by this 
sudden introduction, gravely shook hands with the boy. 

During this time the young Oroid who had guided 
them down from the forest above the tunnels, had been 
standing respectfully behind them, a few feet away. A 
short distance farther on several small groups of natives 
were gathered, watching the strangers. With a few 


The Chemist and his Son 151 

swift words Loto now dismissed their guide, who bowed 
low with his hands to his forehead and left them. 

Led by the Chemist, they continued on down into the 
city, talking earnestly, telling him the details of their trip. 
The natives followed them as they moved forward, and as 
they entered the city others looked at them curiously and, 
the Very Young Man thought, with a little hostility, yet 
always from a respectful distance. Evidently it was 
night, or at least the time of sleep at this hour, for the 
streets they passed through were nearly deserted. 


CHAPTER XIX 


THE CITY OF ARETE 


HE city of Arite, as it looked to them now, was 



strange beyond anything they had ever seen, but 


still by no means as extraordinary as they had expected 
it would be. The streets through which they walked 
were broad and straight, and were crossed by others at 
regular intervals of two or three hundred feet. These 
streets paralleled each other with mathematical regularity. 
The city thus was laid out most orderly, but with one pe¬ 
culiarity; the streets did not run in two directions cross¬ 
ing each other at right angles, but in three, each inclined 
to an equal degree with the others. The blocks of houses 
between them, therefore, were cut into diamond-shaped 
sections and into triangles, never into squares or oblongs. 

Most of the streets seemed paved with large, flat gray 
blocks of a substance resembling highly polished stone, or 
a form of opaque glass. There were no sidewalks, but 
close up before the more pretentious of the houses, were 
small trees growing. 

The houses themselves were generally triangular or 
diamond-shaped, following the slope of the streets. They 
were, most of them, but two stories in height, with flat 
roofs on some of which flowers and trellised vines were 
growing. They were built principally of the same 
smooth, gray blocks with which the streets were paved. 
Their windows were large and numerous, without win¬ 
dow-panes, but closed now, nearly all of them by shining, 
silvery curtains that looked as though they might have 


The City of Arite 153 

been woven from the metal itself. The doors were of 
heavy metal, suggesting brass or gold. On some of the 
houses tiny low-railed balconies hung from the upper win¬ 
dows out over the street. 

The party proceeded quietly through this now deserted 
city, crossing a large tree-lined square, or park, that by the 
confluence of many streets seemed to mark its center, and 
turned finally into another diagonal street that dropped 
swiftly down towards the lake front. At the edge of a 
promontory this street abruptly terminated in a broad 
flight of steps leading down to a little beach on the lake 
shore perhaps a hundred feet below. 

The Chemist turned sharp to the right at the head of 
these steps, and, passing through the opened gateway of 
an arch in a low gray wall, led his friends into a garden 
in which were growing a profusion of flowers. These 
flowers, they noticed, were most of them blue or gray, or 
of a pale silvery whiteness, lending to the scene a pecu¬ 
liarly wan, wistful appearance, yet one of extraordinary, 
quite unearthly beauty. 

Through the garden a little gray-pebbled path wound 
back to where a house stood, nearly hidden in a grove 
of trees, upon a bluff directly overlooking the lake. 

“My home, gentlemen,” said the Chemist, with a wave 
of his hand. 

As they approached the house they heard, coming from 
within, the mellow voice of a woman singing—an odd 
little minor theme, with a quaint, lilting rhythm, and 
words they could not distinguish. Accompanying the 
voice were the delicate tones of some stringed instrument 
suggesting a harp. 

“We are expected,” remarked the Chemist with a smile. 
“Lylda is still up, waiting for us.” The Very Young 
Man’s heart gave a leap at the mention of the name. 

From the outside, the Chemist’s house resembled many 


154 77 &£ Girl in the Goldc Atom 

of the larger ones they had seen as they came through the 
city. It was considerably more pretentious than any they 
had yet noticed, diamond-shaped—that is to say, a flat¬ 
tened oblong—two stories in height and built of large 
blocks of the gray polished stone. 

Unlike the other houses, its sides were not bare, but 
were partly covered by a luxuriant growth of vines and 
trellised flowers. There were no balconies under its win¬ 
dows, except on the lake side. There, at the height of 
the second story, a covered balcony broad enough almost 
to be called a veranda, stretched the full width of the 
house. 

A broad door of brass, fronting the garden, stood partly 
open, and the Chemist pushed it wide and ushered in his 
friends. They found themselves now in a triangular hall¬ 
way, or lobby, with an open arch in both its other sides 
giving passage into rooms beyond. Through one of these 
archways the Chemist led them, into what evidently was 
the main living-room of the dwelling. 

It was a high-ceilinged room nearly triangular in shape, 
thirty feet possibly at its greatest width. In one wall 
were set several silvery-curtained windows, opening out 
on to the lake. On the other side was a broad fireplace 
and hearth with another archway beside it leading farther 
into the house. The walls of the room were lined with 
small gray tiles; the floor also was tiled with gray and 
white, set in design.' 

On the floor were spread several large rugs, apparently 
made of grass or fibre. The walls were bare, except be¬ 
tween the windows, where two long, narrow, heavily em¬ 
broidered strips of golden cloth were hanging. 

In the center of the room stood a circular stone table, 
its top a highly polished black slab of stone. This table 
was set now for a meal, with golden metal dishes, huge 
metal goblets of a like color, and beautifully wrought table 


The City of A rite 155 

utensils, also of gold. Around the table were several 
small chairs, made of wicker. In the seat of each lay a 
padded fiber cushion, and over the back was hung a small 
piece of embroidered cloth. 

With the exception of these chairs and table, the room 
was practically devoid of furniture. Against one wall 
was a smaller table of stone, with a few miscellaneous ob¬ 
jects on its top, and under each window stood a small 
white stone bench. 

A fire glowed in the fireplace grate—a fire that burned 
without flame. On the hearth before it, reclining on 
large silvery cushions, was a woman holding in her hands 
a small stringed instrument like a tiny harp or lyre. 
When the men entered the room she laid her instrument 
aside and rose to her feet. 

As she stood there for an instant, expectant, with the 
light of welcome in her eyes, the three strangers beheld 
what to them seemed the most perfect vision of feminine 
loveliness they had ever seen. 

The woman’s age was at first glance indeterminate. 
By her face, her long, slender, yet well-rounded neck, and 
the slim curves of her girlish figure, she might have been 
hardly more than twenty. Yet in her bearing there was 
that indefinable poise and dignity that bespoke the more 
mature, older woman. 

She was about five feet tall, with a slender, almost 
fragile, yet perfectly rounded body. ' Her dress consisted 
of a single flowing garment of light-blue silk, reaching 
from the shoulders to just above her knees. It was 
girdled at the waist by a thick golden cord that hung with 
golden tasseled pendants at her side. 

A narrower golden cord crossed her breast and shoul¬ 
ders. Her arms, legs, and shoulders were bare. Her 
skin was smooth as satin, milky white, and suffused with 
the delicate tints of many colors. Her hair was thick and 


156 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

very black; it was twisted into two tresses that fell for¬ 
ward over each shoulder nearly to her waist and ended 
with a little silver ribbon and tassel tied near the bottom. 

Her face was a delicate oval. Her lips were full and 
of a color for which in English there is no name. It 
would have been red doubtless by sunlight in the world 
above, but here in this silver light of phosphorescence, the 
color red, as we see it, was impossible. 

Her nose was small, of Grecian type. Her slate-gray 
eyes were rather large, very slightly upturned at the cor¬ 
ners, giving just a touch of the look of our women of the 
Orient. Her lashes were long and very black. In con¬ 
versation she lowered them at times with a charming 
combination of feminine humility and a touch of coquetry. 
Her gaze from under them had often a peculiar 
look of melting softness, yet always it was direct and 
honest. 

Such was the woman who quietly stood beside her 
hearth, waiting to welcome these strange guests from an¬ 
other world. 

As the men entered through the archway, the boy Loto 
pushed quickly past them in his eagerness to get ahead, 
and, rushing across the room, threw himself into the 
woman’s arms crying happily, “Mita, mita.” 

The woman kissed him affectionately. Then, before 
she had time to speak, the boy pulled her forward, holding 
her tightly by one hand. 

‘'This is my mother,” he said with a pretty little ges¬ 
ture. “Her name is Lylda.” 

The woman loosened herself from his grasp with a 
smile of amusement, and, native fashion, bowed low with 
her hands to her forehead. 

“My husband’s friends are welcome,” she said simply. 
Her voice was soft and musical. She spoke English per- 


The City of Arite 157 

fectly, with an intonation of which the most cultured 
woman might be proud, but with a foreign accent much 
more noticeable than that of her son. 

“A very long time we have been waiting for you,” she 
added; and then, as an afterthought, she impulsively of¬ 
fered them her hand in their own manner. 

The Chemist kissed his wife quietly. In spite of the 
presence of strangers, for a moment she dropped her re¬ 
serve, her arms went up around his neck, and she clung 
to him an instant. Gently putting her down, the Chemist 
turned to his friends. 

“I think Lylda has supper waiting,” he said. Then as 
he looked at their torn, woolen suits that once were white, 
and the ragged shoes upon their feet, he added with a 
smile, “But I think I can make you much more com¬ 
fortable first.” 

He led them up a broad, curving flight of stone steps 
to a room above, where they found a shallow pool of 
water, sunk below the level of the floor. Here he left 
them to bathe, getting them meanwhile robes similar to 
his own, with which to replace their own soiled garments. 
In a little while, much refreshed, they descended to the 
room below, where Lylda had supper ready upon the table 
waiting for them. 

“Only a little while ago my father and Aura left,” 
said Lylda, as they sat down to eat. 

“Lylda’s younger sister,” the Chemist explained. “She 
lives with her father here in Ante.” 

The Very Young Man parted his lips to speak. Then, 
with heightened color in his cheeks, he closed them again. 

They were deftly served at supper by a little native girl 
who was dressed in a short tunic reaching from waist to 
knees, with circular discs of gold covering her breasts. 
There was cooked meat for the meal, a white starchy 


158 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

form of vegetable somewhat resembling a potato, a num¬ 
ber of delicious fruits of unfamiliar variety, and for drink 
the juice of a fruit that tasted more like cider than any¬ 
thing they could name. 

At the table Loto perched himself beside the Very 
Young Man, for whom he seemed to have taken a sudden 
fancy. 

“I like you,” he said suddenly, during a lull in the talk. 

“I like you, too,” answered the Very Young Man. 

“Aura is very beautiful; you’ll like her.” 

“Fm sure I will,” the Very Young Man agreed soberly. 

“What’s your name?” persisted the boy. 

“My name’s Jack. And Fm glad you like me. I think 
we’re friends, don’t you?” 

And so they became firm friends, and, as far as cir¬ 
cumstances would permit, inseparable companions. 

Lylda presided over the supper with the charming grace 
of a competent hostess. She spoke seldom, yet when the 
conversation turned to the great world above in which her 
husband was born, she questioned intelligently and with 
eager interest. Evidently she had a considerable knowl¬ 
edge of the subject, but with an almost childish insatiable 
curiosity she sought from her guests more intimate details 
of the world they lived in. 

When in lighter vein their talk ran into comments upon 
the social life of their own world, Lylda’s ready wit, com¬ 
bined with her ingenuous simplicity, put to them many 
questions which made the giving of an understandable an¬ 
swer sometimes amusingly difficult. 

When the meal was over the three travelers found 
themselves very sleepy, and all of them were glad when 
the Chemist suggested that they retire almost immediately. 
He led them again to the upper story into the bedroom 
they were to occupy. There, on the low bedsteads, soft 


The City of Arite 159 

with many quilted coverings, they passed the remainder 
of the time of sleep in dreamless slumber, utterly worn 
out by their journey, nor guessing what the morning 
would bring forth. 


CHAPTER XX 


THE WORLD OF THE RING 

N EXT morning after breakfast the four men sat upon 
the balcony overlooking the lake, and prepared to 
hear the Chemist’s narrative of what had happened since 
he left them five years before. They had already told him 
of events in their world, the making of the chemicals 
and their journey down into the ring, and now they were 
ready to hear his story. 

At their ease here upon the balcony, reclining in long 
wicker chairs of the Chemist’s own design, as he proudly 
admitted, they felt at peace with themselves and the 
world. Below them lay the shining lake, above spread a 
clear, star-studded sky. Against their faces blew the cool 
breath of a gentle summer’s breeze. 

As they sat silent for a moment, enjoying almost with 
awe the beauties of the scene, and listening to the soft 
voice of Lylda singing to herself in the garden, the Very 
Young Man suddenly thought of the one thing lacking to 
make his enjoyment perfect. 

“I wish I had a cigarette/’ he remarked wistfully. 

The Chemist with a smile produced cigars of a leaf 
that proved a very good substitute for tobacco. They 
lighted them with a tiny metal lighter of the fiint-and- 
steel variety, filled with a fluffy inflammable wick—a con¬ 
trivance of the Chemist’s own making—and then he 
started his narrative. 

“There is much to tell you, my friends,” he began 

160 


The World of the Ring 161 

thoughtfully. “Much that will interest you, shall we say 
from a socialistic standpoint? I shall make it brief, for 
we have no time to sit idly talking. 

“I must tell you now, gentlemen, of what I think you 
have so far not even had a hint. You have found me 
living here,’' he hesitated and smiled, “well at least under 
pleasant and happy circumstances. Yet as a matter of 
fact, your coming was of vital importance, not only to 
me and my family, but probably to the future welfare of 
the entire Oroid nation. 

“We are approaching a crisis here with which I must 
confess I have felt myself unable to cope. With your 
help, more especially with the power of the chemicals you 
have brought with you, it may be possible for us to deal 
successfully with the conditions facing us.” 

“What are they?” asked the Very Young Man eagerly. 

“Perhaps it would be better for me to tell you chrono¬ 
logically the events as they have occurred. As you re¬ 
member when I left you twelve years ago-” 

“Five years,” interrupted the Very Young Man. 

“Five or twelve, as you please,” said the Chemist smil¬ 
ing. “It was my intention then, as you know, to come 
back to you after a comparatively short stay here.” 

“And bring Mrs.—er—Lylda, with you,” put in the 
Very Young Man, hesitating in confusion over the Chris¬ 
tian name. 

“And bring Lylda with me,” finished the Chemist. “I 
got back here without much difficulty, and in a very much 
shorter time and with less effort than on my first trip. I 
tried an entirely different method; I stayed as large as 
possible while descending, and diminished my size ma¬ 
terially only after I had reached the bottom.” 

“I told you-” said the Big Business Man. 

“It was a dangerous method of procedure, but I made 
it successfully without mishap. 




162 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

“Lylda and I were married in native fashion shortly 
^fter I reached x\rite.” 

“How was that; what fashion?” the Very Young Man 
wanted to know, but the Chemist went on. 

“It was my intention to stay here only a few weeks and 
then return with Lylda. She was willing to follow me 
anywhere I might take her, because—well, perhaps you 
would hardly understand, but—women here are different 
in many ways than you know them. 

“I stayed several months, still planning to leave almost 
at any time. I found this world an intensely interesting 
study. Then, when—Loto was expected, I again post¬ 
poned my departure. 

“I had been here over a year before I finally gave up 
my intention of ever returning to you. I have no close 
relatives above, you know, no one who cares much for me 
or for whom I care, and my life seemed thoroughly estab¬ 
lished here. 

“I am afraid gentlemen, I am offering excuses for my¬ 
self—for my desertion of my own country in its time of 
need. I have no defense. As events turned out I could 
not have helped probably, very much, but still—that is 
no excuse. I can only say that your world up there 
seemed so very—very—far away. Events up there had 
become to me only vague memories as of a dream. And 
Lylda and my little son were so near, so real and vital to 
me. Well, at any rate I stayed, deciding definitely to 
make my home and to end my days here.” 

“What did you do about the drugs?” asked the Doctor. 

“I kept them hidden carefully for nearly a year,” the 
Chemist replied. “Then fearing lest they should in some 
way get loose, I destroyed them. They possess a dia¬ 
bolical power, gentlemen; I am afraid of it.” 

“They called you the Master,” suggested the Very 
Young Man, after a pause. “Why was that?” 




The World of the Ring 163 

The Chemist smiled. “They do call me the Master. 
That has been for several years. I suppose I am the most 
important individual in the nation to-day.” 

“I should think you would be,” said the Very Young 
Man quickly. “What you did, and with the knowledge 
you have.” 

The Chemist went on. “Lylda and I lived with her 
father and Aura—her mother is dead you know—until 
after Loto was born. Then we had a house further up 
in the city. Later, about eight years ago, I built this 
house we now occupy and Lylda laid out its garden 
which she is tremendously proud of, and which I think 
is the finest in Arite. 

“Because of what I had done in the Malite war, I be¬ 
came naturally the King’s adviser. Every one felt me the 
savior of the nation, which, in a way, I suppose I was. 
I never used the drugs again and, as only a very few of 
the people ever understood them, or in fact ever knew 
of them or believed in their existence, my extraordinary 
change in stature was ascribed to some supernatural 
power. I have always since been credited with being able 
to exert that power at will, although I never used it but 
that once.” 

“You have it again now,” said the Doctor smiling. 

“Yes, I have, thank God,” answered the Chemist fer¬ 
vently, “though I hope I never shall have to use it.” 

“Aren’t you planning to go back with us,” asked the 
Very Young Man, “even for a visit?” 

The Chemist shook his head. “My way lies here,” he 
said quietly, yet with deep feeling. 

A silence followed; finally the Chemist roused him¬ 
self from his reverie, and went on. “Although I never 
again changed my stature, there were a thousand different 
ways in which I continued to make myself—well, famous 
throughout the land. I have taught these people many 


164 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

things, gentlemen—like this for instance.” He indicated 
his cigar, and the chair in which he was sitting. “You 
cannot imagine what a variety of things one knows be¬ 
yond the knowledge of so primitive a race as this. 

“And so gradually, I became known as the Master. I 
have no official position, but everywhere I am known by 
that name. As a matter of fact, for the past year at least, 

it has been rather too descriptive a title-” the Chemist 

smiled somewhat ruefully—“for I have had in reality, and 
have now, the destiny of the country on my shoulders.” 

“You’re not threatened with another war?” asked the 
Very Young Man. 

“No, not exactly that. But I had better go on with my 
story first. This is a very different world now, gentle¬ 
men, from that I first entered twelve years ago. I think 
first I should tell you about it as it was then.” 

His three friends nodded their agreement and the 
Chemist continued. 

“I must make it clear to you gentlemen, the one great 
fundamental difference between this world and yours. In 
the evolution of this race there has been no cause for 
strife—the survival of the fittest always has been an un¬ 
known doctrine—a non-existent problem. 

“In extent this Inner Surface upon which we are now 
living is nearly as great as the surface of your own earth. 
From the earliest known times it has been endowed with a 
perfect climate—a climate such as you are now enjoy- 

• yy 

mg. 

The Very Young Man expanded his chest and looked 
his appreciation. 

“The climate, the rainfall, everything is ideal for crops 
and for living conditions. In the matter of food, one 
needs in fact do practically nothing. Fruits of a variety 
ample to sustain life, grow wild in abundance. Vege¬ 
tables planted are harvested seemingly without blight or 



The World of the Ring 165 

hazard of any kind. No destructive insects have ever 
impeded agriculture; no wild animals have ever existed to 
harass humanity. Nature in fact, offers every help and 
no obstacle towards making a simple, primitive life easy 
to live. 

“Under such conditions the race developed only so far 
as was necessary to ensure a healthful pleasant existence. 
Civilization here is what you would call primitive: wants 
are few and easily supplied—too easily, probably, for 
without strife these people have become—well shall I say 
effeminate ? They are not exactly that—it is not a good 
word.” 

“I should think that such an unchanging, unrigorous 
climate would make a race deteriorate in physique 
rapidly,” observed the Doctor. 

“How about disease down here?” asked the Big Busi¬ 
ness Man. 

“It is a curious thing,” replied the Chemist. “Cleanli¬ 
ness seems to be a trait inborn with every individual in 
this race. It is more than godliness; it is the one great 
cardinal virtue. You must have noticed it, just in coming 
through Arite. Personal cleanliness of the people, and 
cleanliness of houses, streets—of everything. It is truly 
extraordinary to what extent they go to make everything 
inordinately, immaculately clean. Possibly for that 
reason, and because there seems never to have been any 
serious disease germs existing here, sickness as you know 
it, does not exist.” 

“Guess you better not go into business here,” said the 
Very Young Man with a grin at the Doctor. 

“There is practically no illness worthy of the name,” 
went on the Chemist. “The people live out their lives 
and, barring accident, die peacefully of old age.” 

“How old do they live to be ?” asked the Big Business 
Man. 


166 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

“About the same as with you,” answered the Chemist. 
“Only of course as we measure time.” 

“Say how about that?” the Very Young Man asked. 
“My watch is still going—is it ticking out the old time or 
the new time down here?” 

“I should say probably—certainly—it was giving time 
of your own world, just as it always did,” the Chemist 
replied. 

“Well, there’s no way of telling, is there?” said the Big 
Business Man. 

“What is the exact difference in time?” the Doctor 
asked. 

“That is something I have had no means of determin¬ 
ing. It was rather a curious thing; when I left that letter 
for you,” the Chemist turned to the Doctor—“it never 
occurred to me that although I had told you to start down 
here on a certain day, I would be quite at a loss to calcu¬ 
late when that day had arrived. It was my estimation 
after my first trip here that time in this world passed at 
a rate about two and two-fifth times faster than it does 
in your world. That is as near as I ever came to it. We 
can calculate it more closely now, since we have only the 
interval of your journey down as an indeterminate quan¬ 
tity.” 

“How near right did you hit it? When did you ex¬ 
pect us?” asked the Doctor. 

“About thirty days ago; I have been waiting since then. 
I sent nearly a hundred men through the tunnels into the 
forest to guide you in.” 

“You taught them pretty good English,” said the Very 
Young Man. “They were tickled to death that they knew 
it, too,” he added with a reminiscent grin. 

“You say about thirty days; how do you measure 
time down here?” asked the Big Business Man. 

“I call a day, one complete cycle of sleeping and eat- 



The World of the Ring 167 

mg,” the Chemist replied. “I suppose that is the best 
translation of the Oroid word; we have a word that means 
about the same thing/’ 

“How long is a day?” inquired the Very Young Man. 

“It seems in the living about the same as your twenty- 
four hours; it occupies probably about the interval of time 
of ten hours in your world. 

“You see,” the Chemist went on, “we ordinarily eat 
twice between each time of sleep—once after rising—and 
once a few hours before bedtime. Workers at severe 
muscular labor sometimes eat a light meal in between, but 
the custom is not general. Time is generally spoken of 
as so many meals, rather than days.” 

“But what is the arbitrary standard?” asked the Doc¬ 
tor. “Do you have an equivalent for weeks, or months or 
years?” 

“Yes,” answered the Chemist, “based on astronomy the 
same as in your world. But I would rather not explain 
that now. I want to take you, later to-day, to see LyIda’s 
father. You will like him. He is—well, what we might 
call a scientist. He talks English fairly well. We can 
discuss astronomy with him; you will find him very in¬ 
teresting.” 

“How can you tell time?” the Very Young Man wanted 
to know. “There is no sun to go by. You have no 
clocks, have you?” 

“There is one downstairs,” answered the Chemist, “but 
you didn’t notice it. Lylda’s father has a very fine one; 
he will show it to you.” 

“It seems to me,” began the Doctor thoughtfully after 
a pause, reverting to their previous topic, “that without 
sickness, under such ideal living conditions as you say ex¬ 
ist here, in a very short time this world would be over- 
populated.” 

“Nature seems to have taken care of that,” the Chem- 


168 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

ist answered, “and as a matter of fact quite the reverse 
is true. Women mature in life at an age you would call 
about sixteen. But early marriages are not the rule; sel¬ 
dom is a woman married before she is twenty—frequently 
she is much older. Her period of child-bearing, too, is 
comparatively short—frequently less than ten years. The 
result is few children, whose rate of mortality is exceed¬ 
ingly slow.” 

“How about the marriages?” the Very Young Man 
suggested. “You were going to tell us." 

“Marriages are by mutual consent,” answered the 
Chemist, “solemnized by a simple, social ceremony. They 
are for a stated period of time, and are renewed later if 
both parties desire. When a marriage is dissolved chil¬ 
dren are cared for by the mother generally, and her main¬ 
tenance if necessary is provided for by the government. 
The state becomes the guardian also of all illegitimate 
children and children of unknown parentage. But of 
both these latter classes there are very few. They work 
for the government, as do many other people, until they 
are of age, when they become free to act as they please.” 

“You spoke about women being different than we 
knew them; how are they different?” the Very Young 
Man asked. “If they’re all like Lylda I think they’re 
great,” he added enthusiastically, flushing a little at his 
own temerity. 

The Chemist smiled his acknowledgment of the com¬ 
pliment. “The status of women—and their character—is 
I think one of the most remarkable things about this race. 
You will remember, when I returned from here the first 
time, that I was much impressed by the kindliness of these 
people. Because of their history and their government 
they seem to have become imbued with the milk of human 
kindness to a degree approaching the Utopian. 

“Crime here is practically non-existent; there is noth- 


The World of the Ring 169 

ing over which contention can arise. What crimes are 
committed are punished with a severity seemingly out of 
all proportion to what you would call justice. A persist¬ 
ent offender even of fairly trivial wrongdoing is put to 
death without compunction. There is no imprisonment, 
except for those awaiting trial. Punishment is a repri¬ 
mand with the threat of death if the offense is committed 
again, or death itself immediately. Probably this very 
severity and the swiftness with which punishment is 
meted out, to a large extent discourages wrongdoing. 
But, fundamentally, the capacity for doing wrong is lack¬ 
ing in these people. 

“I have said practically nothing exists over which con¬ 
tention can arise. That is not strictly true. No race of 
people can develop without some individual contention 
over the possession of their women. The passions of 
love, hate and jealousy, centering around sex and its prob¬ 
lems, are as necessarily present in human beings as life 
itself. 

“Love here is deep, strong and generally lasting; it 
lacks fire, intensity—perhaps. I should say it is rather 
of a placid quality. Hatred seldom exists; jealousy is 
rare, because both sexes, in their actions towards the 
other, are guided by a spirit of honesty and fairness that 
is really extraordinary. This is true particularly of the 
women; they are absolutely honest—square, through and 
through. 

“Crimes against women are few, yet in general they are 
the most prevalent type we have. They are punishable by 
death—even those that you would characterize as com¬ 
paratively slight offenses. It is significant too, that, in 
judging these crimes, but little evidence is required. A 
slight chain of proven circumstances and the word of the 
woman is all that is required. 

“This you will say, places a tremendous power in the 


170 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

hands of women. It does; yet they realize it thoroughly, 
and justify it. Although they know that almost at their 
word a man will be put to death, practically never, I am 
convinced, is this power abused. With extreme infre¬ 
quency, a female is proven guilty of lying. The penalty 
is death, for there is no place here for such a woman! 

“The result is that women are accorded a freedom of 
movement far beyond anything possible in your world. 
They are safe from harm. Their morals are, according 
to the standard here, practically one hundred per cent per¬ 
fect. With short-term marriages, dissolvable at will, 
there is no reason why they should be otherwise. Curi¬ 
ously enough too, marriages are renewed frequently— 
more than that, I should say, generally—for life-long 
periods. Polygamy with the consent of all parties is per¬ 
mitted, but seldom practiced. Polyandry is unlawful, and 
but few cases of it ever appear. 

“You may think all this a curious system, gentlemen, 
but it works.” 

“That’s the answer,” muttered the Very Young Man. 
It was obvious he was still thinking of Lylda and her 
sister and with a heightened admiration and respect. 


CHAPTER XXI 


A LIFE WORTH LIVING 

T HE appearance of Lylda at one of the long win¬ 
dows of the balcony, interrupted the men for a 
moment. She was dressed in a tunic of silver, of curious 
texture, like flexible woven metal, reaching to her knees. 
On her feet were little fiber sandals. Her hair was 
twisted in coils, piled upon her head, with a knot low at 
the back of the neck. From her head in graceful folds 
hung a thin scarf of gold. 

She stood waiting in the window a moment for them to 
notice her; then she said quietly, “I am going for a time 
to the court.’' She hesitated an instant over the words. 
The Chemist inclined his head in agreement, and with a 
smile at her guests, and a little bow, she withdrew. 

The visitors looked inquiringly at their host. 

“I must tell you about our government,’’ said the 
Chemist. “Lylda plays quite an important part in it.” 
He smiled at their obvious surprise. 

“The head of the government is the king. In reality 
he is more like the president of a republic; he is chosen by 
the people to serve for a period of about twenty years. 
The present king is now in—well let us say about the 
fifteenth year of his service. This translation of time 
periods into English is confusing,” he interjected some¬ 
what apologetically. “We shall see the king to-morrow; 
you will find him a most intelligent, likeable man. 

“As a sort of congress, the king has one hundred and 
fifty advisers, half of them women, who meet about once 


172 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

a month. Lylda is one of these women. He also has 
an inner circle of closer, more intimate counselors con¬ 
sisting of four men and four women. One of these 
women is the queen; another is Lylda. I am one of the 
men. 

‘‘The capital of the nation is Arite. Each of the other 
cities governs itself in so far as its own local problems are 
concerned according to a somewhat similar system, but 
all are under the central control of the Arite government.” 

“How about the country in between, the—the rural 
population ?” asked the Big Business Man. 

“It is all apportioned oft to the nearest city,” answered 
the Chemist. “Each city controls a certain amount of 
the land around it. 

“This congress of one hundred and fifty is the law¬ 
making body. The judiciary is composed of one court in 
each city. There is a leader of the court, or judge, and a 
jury of forty—twenty men and twenty women. The 
juries are chosen for continuous service for a period of 
five years. Lylda is at present serving in the Arite 
court. They meet very infrequently and irregularly, 
called as occasion demands. A two-thirds vote is neces¬ 
sary for a decision; there is no appeal.” 

“Are there any lawyers?” asked the Big Business Man. 

“There is no one who makes that his profession, no. 
Generally the accused talks for himself or has some rela¬ 
tive, or possibly some friend to plead his case.” 

“You have police?” the Doctor asked. 

“A very efficient police force, both for the cities and in 
the country. Really they are more like detectives than 
police; they are the men I sent up into the forest to meet 
you. We also have an army, which at present consists al¬ 
most entirely of this same police force. After the Malite 
war it was of course very much larger, but of late years 
it has been disbanded almost completely. 


A Life Worth Living 173 

“How about money?” the Very Young Man wanted to 
know. 

“There is none!” answered the Chemist with a smile. 

“Great Scott, how can you manage that?” ejaculated 
the Big Business Man. 

“Our industrial system undoubtedly is peculiar,” the 
Chemist replied, “but I can only say again, it works. We 
have no money, and, so far, none apparently is needed. 
Everything is bought and sold as an exchange. For in¬ 
stance, suppose I wish to make a living as a farmer. I 
have my land-” 

“How did you get it?” interrupted the Very Young 
Man quickly. 

“All the land is divided up pro rata and given by each 
city to its citizens. At the death of its owner it reverts to 
the government, and each citizen coming of age receives 
his share from the surplus always remaining.” 

“What about women? Can they own land too?” asked 
the Very Young Man. 

“They have identical rights with men in everything,” 
the Chemist answered. 

“But women surely cannot cultivate their own land?” 
the Doctor said. Evidently he was thinking of Lylda’s 
fragile little body, and certainly if most of the Oroid 
women were like her, labour in the fields would be for 
them quite impossible. 

“A few women, by choice, do some of the lighter forms 
of manual.labor—but they are very few. Nearly every 
woman marries within a few years after she receives her 
land; if it is to be cultivated, her husband then takes 
charge of it.” 

“Is the cultivation of land compulsory?” asked the Big 
Business Man. 

“Only when in a city’s district a shortage of food is 
threatened. Then the government decides the amount 



174 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

and kind of food needed, and the citizens, drawn by lot, 
are ordered to produce it. The government watches very 
carefully its food supply. In the case of overproduction, 
certain citizens, those less skillful, are ordered to work at 
something else. 

“This supervision over supply and demand is exercised 
by the government not only in the question of food but in 
manufactures, in fact, in all industrial activities. A very 
nice balance is obtained, so that practically no unnecessary 
work is done throughout the nation. 

“And gentlemen, do you know, as a matter of fact, I 
think that is the secret of a race of people being able to 
live without having to work most of its waking hours? 
If your civilization could eliminate all its unnecessary 
work, there would be far less work to do. 

“I wonder—isn’t this balance of supply and demand 
very difficult to maintain ?” asked the Big Business Man 
thoughtfully. 

“Not nearly so difficult as you would think,” the 
Chemist answered. “In the case of land cultivation, the 
government has a large reserve, the cultivation of which 
it adjusts to maintain this balance. Thus, in some dis¬ 
tricts, the citizens do as they please and are never inter¬ 
fered with. 

“The same is true of manufactures. There is no or¬ 
ganized business in the nation—not even so much as 
the smallest factory—except that conducted by the govern¬ 
ment. Each city has its own factories, whose production 
is carefully planned exactly to equal the demand.” 

“Suppose a woman marries and her land is far away 
from her husband’s? That would be sort of awkward, 
wouldn’t it?” suggested the Very Young Man. 

“Each year at a stated time,” the Chemist answered, 
“transfers of land are made. There are generally enough 
people who want to move to make satisfactory changes of 



A Life Worth Living 175 

location practical. And then of course, the government 
always stands read}^ to take up any two widely separate 
pieces of land, and give others in exchange out of its re¬ 
serve.” 

“Suppose you don't like the new land as well?” ob¬ 
jected the Very Young Man. 

“Almost all land is of equal value,” answered the Chem¬ 
ist. “And of course, its state of cultivation is always 
considered.” 

“You were speaking about not having money,” 
prompted the Very Young Man. 

“The idea is simply this: Suppose I wish to cultivate 
nothing except, let us say, certain vegetables. I register 
with the government my intention and the extent to which 
I propose to go. I receive the government’s consent. I 
then take my crops as I harvest them and exchange them 
for every other article I need.” 

“With whom do you exchange them?” asked the Doc¬ 
tor. 

“Any one I please—or with the government. Ninety 
per cent of everything produced is turned in to the govern¬ 
ment and other articles are taken from its stores.” 

“How is the rate of exchange established?” asked the 
Big Business Man. 

“It is computed by the government. Private exchanges 
are supposed to be made at the same rate. It is against 
the law to cut under the government rate. But it is done, 
although apparently not with sufficient frequency to cause 
any trouble.” 

“I should think it would be tremendously complicated 
and annoying to make all these exchanges,” observed the 
Big Business Man. 

“Not at all,” answered the Chemist, “because of the 
governmental system of credits. The financial standing 
of every individual is carefully kept on record.” 


i/6 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

“Without any money? I don’t get you,” said the Very 
Young Man with a frown of bewilderment. 

The Chemist smiled. “Well, I don’t blame you for 
that. But I think I can make myself clear. Let us take 
the case of Loto, for instance, as an individual. When he 
comes of age he will be allotted his section of land. We 
will assume him to be without family at that time, en¬ 
tirely dependent on his own resources.” 

“Would he never have worked before coming of age?” 
the Very Young Man asked. 

“Children with parents generally devote their entire 
minority to getting an education, and to building their 
bodies properly. Without parents, they are supported by 
the government and live in public homes. Such children, 
during their adolescence, work for the government a 
small portion of their time. 

“Now when Loto comes of age and gets his land, lo¬ 
cated approximately where he desires it, he will make his 
choice as to his vocation. Suppose he wishes not to culti¬ 
vate his land but to work for the government. He is 
given some congenial, suitable employment at which he 
works approximately five hours a day. No matter what 
he elects to do at the time he comes of age the government 
opens an account with him. He is credited with a certain 
standard unit for his work, which he takes from the gov¬ 
ernment in supplies at his own convenience.” 

“What is the unit?” asked the Big Business Man. 

“It is the average work produced by the average worker 
in one day—purely an arbitrary figure.” 

“Like our word horse-power?” put in the Doctor. 

“Exactly. And all merchandise, food and labor is 
valued in terms of it. 

“Thus you see, every individual has his financial stand¬ 
ing—all in relation to the government. He can let his 
balance pile up if he is able, or he can keep it low.” 


A Life Worth Living lyy 

"Suppose he goes into debt?” suggested the Very 
Young Man. 

“In the case of obvious, verified necessity, the govern¬ 
ment will allow him a limited credit. Persistent—shall 
I say willful—debt is a crime.” 

"I thought at first,” said the Big Business Man, “that 
everybody in this nation was on the same financial foot¬ 
ing—that there was no premium put upon skill or indus¬ 
triousness. Now I see that one can accumulate, if not 
money, at least an inordinate amount of the world’> 
goods.” 

"Not such an inordinate amount,” said the Chemis 
smiling. "Because there is no inheritance. A man air 
woman, combining their worldly wealth, may by industry 
acquire more than others, but they are welcome to enjoy 
it. And they cannot, in one lifetime, get such a prepon¬ 
derance of wealth as to cause much envy from those lack¬ 
ing it.” 

"What happens to this house when you and Lylda die, 
if Loto cannot have it?” the Big Business Man asked. 

"It is kept in repair by the government and held until 
some one with a sufficiently large balance wants to buy 
it.” 

"Are all workers paid at the same rate?” asked tne 
Doctor. 

"No, but their wages are much nearer equal than in 
your world.” 

"You have to hire people to work for you, how do you 
pay them?” the Doctor inquired. 

"The rate is determined by governmental standard. I 
pay them by having the amount deducted from my bal¬ 
ance and added to theirs.” 

"When you built this house, how did you go about do¬ 
ing it?” asked the Big Business Man. 

"I simply went to the government, and they built it 


178 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

for me according to my own ideas and wishes, deducting 
its cost from my balance.” 

“What about the public work to be done?’’ asked the 
Big Business Man. “Caring for the city streets, the mak¬ 
ing of roads and all that. Do you have taxes?” 

“No,” answered the Chemist smiling, “we do not have 
taxes. Ouite the reverse, we sometimes have dividends. 

“The government, you must understand, not only con¬ 
ducts a business account with each of its citizens, but one 
with itself also. The value of articles produced is com¬ 
puted with a profit allowance, so that by a successful 
business administration, the government is enabled not 
only to meet its public obligations, but to acquire a sur¬ 
plus to its own credit in the form of accumulated mer¬ 
chandise. This surplus is divided among the people 
every five years—a sort of dividend.” 

“I should think some cities might have much more than 
others,” said the Big Business Man. “That would cause 
discontent, wouldn’t it?” 

“It would probably cause a rush of people to the more 
successful cities. But it doesn’t happen, because each 
city reports to the National government and the whole 
thing is averaged up. You see it is all quite simple,” the 
Chemist finished. “And it makes life here very easy to 
live, and very worth the living.” 

Unnoticed by the four interested men, a small compact¬ 
looking gray cloud had come sweeping down from the 
horizon above the lake and was scudding across the sky 
toward Arite. A sudden sharp crack of thunder inter¬ 
rupted their conversation. 

“Hello, a storm!” exclaimed the Chemist, looking out 
over the lake. “You’ve never seen one, have you? 
Come upstairs.” 

They followed him into the house and upstairs to its 
flat roof. From this point of vantage they saw that the 


A Life Worth Living 179 

house was built with an interior courtyard or pat'lA 
Looking down into this courtyard from the roof they 
could see a little, splashing fountain in its center, with 
flower beds, a narrow gray path, and several small white 
benches. 

The roof, which was guarded with a breast-high para¬ 
pet around both its inner and outer edges, was beautifully 
laid out with a variety of flowers and with trellised 
flower-bearing vines. In one corner were growing a 
number of small trees with great fan-shaped leaves of 
blue and bearing a large bell-shaped silver blossom. 

One end of the roof on the lake side was partially en¬ 
closed. Towards this roofed enclosure the Chemist led 
his friends. Within it a large fiber hammock hung be¬ 
tween two stone posts. At one side a depression in the 
floor perhaps eight feet square was filled with what might 
have been blue pine needles, and a fluffy bluish moss. 
This rustic couch was covered at one end by a canopy of 
vines bearing a little white flower. 

As they entered the enclosure, it began to rain, and the 
Chemist slid forward several panels, closing them in com¬ 
pletely. There were shuttered windows in these walls, 
through which they could look at the scene outside—a 
scene that with the coming storm was weird and beauti¬ 
ful beyond anything they had ever beheld. 

The cloud had spread sufficiently now to blot out the 
stars from nearly half of the sky. It was a thick cloud, 
absolutely opaque, and yet it caused no appreciable dark¬ 
ness, for the starlight it cut off was negligible and the sil¬ 
ver radiation from the lake had more than doubled in 
intensity. 

Under the strong wind that had sprung up the lake as¬ 
sumed now an extraordinary aspect. Its surface was 
raised into long, sweeping waves that curved sharply and 
broke upon themselves. In their tops the silver phospho- 


i8o The Girl in the Golden Atom 

^*t>scence glowed and whirled until the whole surface of 
the lake seemed filled with a dancing white fire, twisting, 
turning and seeming to leap out of the water high into 
the air. 

Several small sailboats, square, flat little catamarans, 
they looked, showed black against the water as they scud¬ 
ded for shore, trailing lines of silver out behind them. 

The wind increased in force. Below, on the beach, a 
huge rock lay in the water, against which the surf was 
breaking. Columns of water at times shot into the air 
before the face of the rock, and were blown away by the 
wind in great clouds of glistening silver. Occasionally it 
thundered with a very sharp intense crack accompanied by 
a jagged bolt of bluish lightning that zigzagged dowrn 
from the low-hanging cloud. 

Then came the rain in earnest, a solid, heavy torrent, 
that bent down the wind and smoothed the surface of the 
lake. The rain fell almost vertically, as though it were a 
tremendous curtain of silver strings. And each of these 
strings broke apart into great shining pearls as the eye 
followed downward the course of the raindrops. 

For perhaps ten minutes the silver torrent poured down. 
Then suddenly it ceased. The wind had died away; in 
the air there was the fresh warm smell of wet and steam¬ 
ing earth. From the lake rolled up a shimmering trans¬ 
lucent cloud of mist, like an enormous silver fire mounting 
into the sky. And then, as the gray cloud swept back be¬ 
hind them, beyond the city, and the stars gleamed over¬ 
head, they saw again that great trail of star-dust which 
the Chemist first had seen through his microscope, hang¬ 
ing in an ever broadening arc across the sky, and ending 
vaguely at their feet. 


CHAPTER XXII 


THE TRIAL 

I N a few moments more the storm had passed com¬ 
pletely; only the wet city streets, the mist over the 
lake, and the moist warmth of the air remained. For 
some time the three visitors to this extraordinary world 
stood silent at the latticed windows, awed by what they 
had seen. The noise of the panels as the Chemist slid 
them back brought them to themselves. 

“A curious land, gentlemen,” he remarked quietly. 

“It’s—it’s weird,” the Very Young Man ejaculated. 
The Chemist led them out across the roof to its other 
side facing the city. The street upon which the house 
stood sloped upwards over the hill behind. It was wet 
with the rain and gleamed like a sheet of burnished silver. 
And down its sides now ran two little streams of liquid 
silver fire. 

The street, deserted during the storm, was beginning to 
fill again with people returning to their tasks. At the 
intersection with the next road above, they could see a 
line of sleighs passing. Beneath them, before the wall of 
the garden a little group of men stood talking; on a roof¬ 
top near-by a woman appeared with a tiny naked infant 
which she sat down to nurse in a corner of her garden. 

“A city at work,” said the Chemist with a wave of his 
hand. “Shall we go down and see it?” 

His three friends assented readily, the Very Young 
Man suggesting promptly that they first visit Lylda’s 
father and Aura. 

181 


182 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

“He is teaching Loto this morning/’ said the Chemist 
smiling. 

“Why not go to the court?” suggested the Big Business 
Man. 

“Is the public admitted?” asked the Doctor. 

“Nothing is secret here,” the Chemist answered. “By 
all means, we will go to the court first, if you wish; 
Lylda should be through very shortly.” 

The court of Arite stood about a mile away near the 
lake shore. As they left the house and passed through 
the city streets the respect accorded the Chemist became 
increasingly apparent. The three strangers with him at¬ 
tracted considerable attention, for, although they wore the 
conventional robes in which the more prominent citizens 
were generally attired, their short hair and the pallid 
whiteness of their skins made them objects of curiosity. 
No crowd gathered; those they passed stared a little, 
raised their hands to their foreheads and went their way, 
yet underneath these signs of respect there was with some 
an air of sullenness, of hostility, that the visitors could 
not fail to notice. 

The Oroid men, in street garb, were dressed generally 
in a short metallic-looking tunic of drab, with a brighter- 
colored girdle. The women, most of them, wore only a 
sort of skirt, reaching from waist to knees; a few had 
circular discs covering their breasts. There were hardly 
any children to be seen, except occasionally a little face 
staring at them from a window, or peering down from 
a roof-top. Once or twice they passed a woman with an 
infant slung across her back in a sort of hammock. 

The most common vehicle was the curious form of 
sleigh in which they had ridden down through the tunnels. 
They saw also a few little two-wheeled carts, with wheels 
that appeared to be a solid segment of tree-trunk. All 


The Trial 183 

the vehicles were drawn by meek-looking little gray ani¬ 
mals like a small deer without horns. 

The court-house of Arite, though a larger building, 
from the outside was hardly different than most others in 
the city. It was distinct, however, in having on either 
side of the broad doorway that served as its main entrance, 
a large square stone column. 

As they entered, passing a guard who saluted them re¬ 
spectfully, the visitors turned from a hallway and as¬ 
cended a flight of steps. At the top they found them¬ 
selves on a balcony overlooking the one large room that 
occupied almost the entire building. The balcony ran 
around all three sides (the room was triangular in shape) 
and was railed with a low stone parapet. On it were per¬ 
haps fifty people, sitting quietly on stone benches that 
lay close up behind the parapet. An attendant stood at 
each of the corners of the balcony; the one nearest bowed 
low as the Chemist and his companions entered silently 
and took their seats. 

From the balcony the entire room below was in plain 
view. At the apex of its triangle sat the judge, on a 
raised dais of white stone with a golden canopy over it. 
He was a man about fifty—this leader of the court— 
garbed in a long loose robe of white. His hair, that fell 
on his shoulders, was snowy white, and around his fore¬ 
head was a narrow white band. He held in his hand a 
sort of scepter of gold with a heavy golden triangle at its 
end. 

In six raised tiers of unequal length, like a triangular 
flight of stairs across the angle of the room, and directly 
in front of the judge, was the jury—twenty men and 
twenty women, seated in alternate rows. The men wore 
loose robes of gray; the women robes of blue. On a seat 
raised slightly above the others sat a man who evidently 


184 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

was speaker for the men of the jury. On a similar ele¬ 
vated seat was the woman speaker; this latter was Lylda. 

Near the center of the room, facing the judge and jury 
were two triangular spaces about twenty feet across, en¬ 
closed with a breast-high wall of stone. Within each of 
these enclosures were perhaps ten or twelve people seated 
on small stone benches. Directly facing the members of 
the jury and between them and the two enclosures, was a 
small platform raised about four feet above the floor, with 
several steps leading up to it from behind. 

A number of attendants dressed in the characteristic 
short tunics, with breastplates and a short sword hanging 
from the waist, stood near the enclosures, and along the 
sides of the room. 

The Chemist leaned over and whispered to his friends: 
"‘Those two enclosed places in the center are for the wit¬ 
nesses. Over there are those testifying for the accused; 
the others are witnesses for the government. The plat¬ 
form is where the accused stands when-” 

He broke off suddenly. An expectant hush seemed to 
run over the room. A door at the side opened, and pre¬ 
ceded and followed by two attendants a man entered, who 
walked slowly across the floor and stood alone upon the 
raised platform facing the jury. 

He was a man of extraordinarily striking look and de¬ 
meanor. He stood considerably over six feet in height, 
with a remarkably .powerful yet lean body. He was 
naked except for a cloth breech clout girdled about his 
loins. His appearance was not that of an Oroid, for be¬ 
side his greater height, and more muscular physique, his 
skin was distinctly of a more brownish hue. His hair 
was cut at the base of the neck in Oroid fashion; it 
was black, with streaks of silver running through it. 
His features were large and cast in a rugged mold. 
His mouth was cruel, and wore now a sardonic smile. He 



The Trial 


i8 5 

stood erect with head thrown back and arms folded across 
his breast, calmly facing the men and women who were 
to judge him. 

1 he Very Young Man gripped the Chemist by the arm. 
“Who is that V he whispered. 

The Chemist’s lips were pressed together; he seemed 
deeply affected. “I did not know they caught him,’’ he 
answered softly. “It must have been just this morning.” 

The Very Young Man looked at Lylda. Her face was 
placid, but her breast was rising and falling more rapidly 
than normal, and her hands in her lap were tightly 
clenched. 

The judge began speaking quietly, amid a deathlike 
silence. For over five minutes he spoke; once he was in¬ 
terrupted by a cheer, instantly stifled, and once by a mur¬ 
mur of dissent from several spectators on the balcony 
that called forth instant rebuke from the attendant sta¬ 
tioned there. 

The judge finished his speech, and raised his golden 
scepter slowly before him. As his voice died away, Lylda 
rose to her feet and facing the judge bowed low, with 
hands to her forehead. Then she spoke a few words, 
evidently addressing the women before her. Each of 
them raised her hands and answered in a monosyllable, 
as though affirming an oath. This performance was re¬ 
peated by the men. 

The accused still stood silent, smiling sardonically. 
Suddenly his voice rasped out with a short, ugly intona¬ 
tion and he threw his arms straight out before him. A 
murmur rose from the spectators, and several attendants 
leaned forward towards the platform. But the man only 
looked around at them contemptuously and again folded 
his arms. 

From one of the enclosures a woman came, and 
mounted the platform beside the man. The Chemist 


186 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

whispered, “His wife; she is going to speak for him.” 
But with a muttered exclamation and wave of his arm, 
the man swept her back, and without a word she descended 
the steps and re-entered the railed enclosure. 

Then the man turned and raising his arms spoke an¬ 
grily to those seated in the enclosure. Then he appealed 
to the judge. 

The Chemist whispered in explanation: “He refuses 
any witnesses.” 

At a sign from the judge the enclosure was opened and 
its occupants left the floor, most of them taking seats upon 
the balcony. 

“Who is he?” the Very Young Man wanted to know, 
but the Chemist ignored his question. 

For perhaps ten minutes the man spoke, obviously in 
his own defence. His voice was deep and powerful, yet 
he spoke now seemingly without anger; and without an 
air of pleading. In fact his whole attitude seemed 
one of irony and defiance. Abruptly he stopped speaking 
and silence again fell over the room. A man and a 
woman left the other enclosure and mounted the platform 
beside the accused. They seemed very small and fragile, 
as he towered over them, looking down at them sneeringly. 

The man and woman conferred a moment in whispers. 
Then the woman spoke. She talked only a few minutes, 
interrupted twice by the judge, once by a question from 
Lylda, and once by the accused himself. 

Then for perhaps ten minutes more her companion ad¬ 
dressed the court. He was a man considerably over mid¬ 
dle age, and evidently, from his dress and bearing, a man 
of prominence in the nation. At one point in his speech 
it became obvious that his meaning was not clearly un¬ 
derstood by the jury. Several of the women whispered 
together, and one rose and spoke to Lylda. She inter¬ 
rupted the witness with a quiet question. Later the ac- 


The Trial 187 

cused himself questioned the speaker until silenced by the 
judge. 

Following this witness came two others. Then the 
judge rose, and looking up to the balcony where the Chem¬ 
ist and his companions were sitting, motioned to the 
Chemist to descend to the floor below. 

The Very Young Man tried once again with his whis¬ 
pered question “What is it?” but the Chemist only smiled, 
and rising quietly left them. 

There was a stir in the court-room as the Chemist 
crossed the main floor. He did not ascend the platform 
with the prisoner, but stood beside it. He spoke to the 
jury quietly, yet with a suppressed power in his voice that 
must have been convincing. He spoke only a moment, 
more with the impartial attitude of one who gives advice 
than as a witness. When he finished, he bowed to the 
court and left the floor, returning at once to his friends 
upon the balcony. 

Following the Chemist, after a moment of silence, the 
judge briefly addressed the prisoner, who stolidly main¬ 
tained his attitude of ironic defiance. 

“He is going to ask the jury to give its verdict now,” 
said the Chemist in a low voice. 

Lylda and her companion leader rose and faced their 
subordinates, and with a verbal monosyllable from each 
member of the jury the verdict was unhesitatingly given. 
As the last juryman’s voice died away, there came a cry 
from the back of the room, a woman tore herself loose 
from the attendants holding her, and running swiftly 
across the room leaped upon the platform. She was a 
slight little woman, almost a child in appearance beside 
the man’s gigantic stature. She stood looking at him a 
moment with heaving breast and great sorrowful eyes 
from which the tears were welling out and flowing down 
her cheeks unheeded. 


188 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

The man’s face softened. He put his hands gently 
upon the sides of her neck. Then, as she began sobbing, 
he folded her in his great arms. For an instant she 
clung to him. Then he pushed her away. Still crying 
softly, she descended from the platform, and walked 
slowly back across the room. 

Hardly had she disappeared when there arose from the 
street outside a faint, confused murmur, as of an angry 
crowd gathering. The judge had left his seat now and 
the jury was filing out of the room. 

The Chemist turned to his friends. “Shall we go?” 
he asked. 

“This trial-” began the Big Business Man. “You 

haven’t told us its significance. This man—good God 
what a figure of power and hate and evil. Who is he ?’’ 

“It must have been evident to you, gentlemen,” the 
Chemist said quietly, “that you have been witnessing an 
event of the utmost importance to us all. I have to tell 
you of the crisis facing us; this trial is its latest develop¬ 
ment. That man-” 

The insistent murmur from the street grew louder. 
Shouts arose and then a loud pounding from the side of 
the building. 

The Chemist broke off abruptly and rose to his feet. 
“Come outside,” he said. 

They followed him through a doorway on to a balcony, 
overlooking the street. Gathered before the court-house 
was a crowd of several hundred men and women. They 
surged up against its entrance angrily, and were held in 
check there by the armed attendants on guard. A smaller 
crowd was pounding violently upon a side door of the 
building. Several people ran shouting down the street, 
spreading the excitement through the city. 

The Chemist and his companions stood in the doorway 
of the balcony an instant, silently regarding this ominous 




The Trial 


i 


189 

scene. The Chemist was just about to step forward, 
when, upon another balcony, nearer the corner of the 
building a woman appeared. She stepped close to 
the edge of the parapet and raised her arms command- 
ingly. 

It was Lylda. She had laid aside her court robe and 
stood now in her glistening silver tunic. Her hair was 
fincoiled, and fell in dark masses over her white shoulders, 
blowing out behind her in the wind. 

The crowd hesitated at the sight of her, and quieted a 
little. She stood rigid as a statue for a moment, holding 
her arms outstretched. Then, dropping them with a ges¬ 
ture of appeal she began to speak. 

At the sound of her voice, clear and vibrant, yet soft, 
gentle and womanly, there came silence from below, and 
after a moment every face was upturned to hers. Gradu¬ 
ally her voice rose in pitch. Its gentle tone was gone 
now—it became forceful, commanding. Then again she 
flung out her arms with a dramatic gesture and stood 
rigid, every line of her body denoting power—almost im¬ 
perious command. Abruptly she ceased speaking, and, 
as she stood motionless, slowly at first, the crowd silently 
dispersed. 

The street below was soon clear. Even those onlookers 
at a distance turned the corner and disappeared: An¬ 
other moment passed, and then Lylda swayed and sank 
upon the floor of the balcony, with her head on her arms 
against its low stone railing—just a tired, gentle, fright¬ 
ened little woman. 

“She did it—how wonderfully she did it,” the Very 
Young Man murmured in admiration. 

“We can handle them now” answered the Chemist. 
“But each time—it is harder. Let us get Lylda and go 
home, gentlemen. I want to tell you all about it.” He 
turned to leave the balcony. 


190 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

“Who was the man? What was he tried for?” the 
Very Young Man demanded. 

“That trial was the first of its kind ever held,” the 
Chemist answered. “The man was condemned to death. 
It was a new crime—the gravest we have ever had to face 
—the crime of treason.” 


CHAPTER XXIII 


lylda’s plan 

B ACK home, comfortably seated upon the broad 
balcony overlooking the lake, the three men sat wait¬ 
ing to hear their host’s explanation of the strange events 
they had witnessed. Lylda busied herself preparing a 
light noonday meal, which she served charmingly on the 
balcony while they talked. 

“My friends,” the Chemist began. “I tried to give you 
this morning, a picture of this world and the life I have 
been leading here. I think you understand, although I 
did not specifically say so, that all I said related to the 
time when I first came here. That you would call this 
life Utopia, because of the way I outlined it, I do not 
doubt; or at least you would call it a state of affairs as 
near Utopian as any human beings can approach. 

“All that is true; it was Utopia. But gentlemen, it is 
so no longer. Things have been changing of recent 
years, until now—well you saw what happened this morn¬ 
ing. 

“I cannot account for the first cause of this trouble. 
Perhaps the Malite war, with its disillusionment to our 
people—I do not know. Faith in human kindness was 
broken : the Oroids could no longer trust implicitly in each 
other. A gradual distrust arose—a growing unrest—a 
dissatisfaction, which made no demands at first, nor 
seemed indeed to have any definite grievances of any sort. 
From it there sprang leaders, who by their greater intel¬ 
ligence created desires that fed and nourished their dis- 

191 


The Girl in the Golden Atom 


192 

satisfaction—gave it a seemingly tangible goal that made 
it far more dangerous than it ever had been before. 

“About a year ago there first came into prominence the 
man whom you saw this morning condemned to death. 
His name is Targo—he is a Malite—full-blooded I be¬ 
lieve, although he says not. For twenty years or more 
he has lived in Orlog, a city some fifty miles from Arite. 
His wife is an Oroid. 

“Targo, by his eloquence, and the power and force of 
his personality, won a large following in Orlog, and to 
a lesser degree in many other cities. Twice, some months 
ago, he was arrested and reprimanded; the last time 
with a warning that a third offence would mean his 
death/’ 

“What is he after?” asked the Very Young Man. 

“The Targos, as they are called, demand principally a 
different division of the land. Under the present system, 
approximately one-third of all the land is in the hands of 
the government. Of that, generally more than half lies 
idle most of the time. The Targos wish to have this 
land divided among the citizens. They claim also that 
most of the city organizations do not produce as large a 
dividend as the Targos could show under their own man¬ 
agement. They have many other grievances that there is 
no reason for me to detail.” 

“Why not let them try out their theories in some city?” 
suggested the Big Business Man. 

“They are trying them,” the Chemist answered. 
“There was a revolution in Orlog about six months ago. 
Several of its officials were assassinated—almost the first 
murders we have ever had. The Targos took possession 
of the government—a brother of this man you saw this 
morning became leader of the city. Orlog withdrew 
from the Oroid government and is now handling its af¬ 
fairs as a separate nation.” 


LyIda's Plan 193 

“I wonder-” began the Big Business Man thought¬ 

fully. “Well, why not let them run it that way, if they 
want to?” 

“No reason, if they were sincere. But they are not 
sincere nor honest fundamentally. Their leaders are for 
the most part Malites, or Oroids with Malite blood. And 
they are fooling the people. Their followers are all the 
more unintelligent, more gullible individuals, or those in 
whom there lies a latent criminal streak. 

“The thing doesn’t work. Sexual license is growing 
in Orlog. Crimes against women are becoming more 
and more frequent. Offences committed by those promi¬ 
nent, or in authority, go unpunished. Women’s testi¬ 
mony is discredited, often by concerted lying on the part 
of men witnesses. 

“Many families are leaving Orlog—leaving their land 
and their homes deserted. In other cities where the Tar- 
gos threaten to gain control the same thing is happening. 
Most of these refugees come to Arite. We cannot take 
care of them; there is not enough land here.” 

“Why not take your army and clean them up?” sug¬ 
gested the Very Young Man. 

They were seated around a little table, at which Lylda 
was serving lunch. At the question she stopped in the 
act of pouring a steaming liquid from a little metal kettle 
into their dainty golden drinking cups and looked at the 
Very Young Man gravely. 

“Very easy it would be to do that perhaps,” she said 
quietly. “But these Targos, except a few^—they are our 
own people. And they too are armed. We cannot fight 
them; we cannot kill them—our own people.” 

“We may have to,” said the Chemist. “But you see, I 
did not realize, I could not believe the extent to which 
this Targo could sway the people. Nor did I at first rea¬ 
lize what evils would result if his ideas were carried out. 




: .v Girl in the Golden Atom 


*4 


le das moiiv followers right here in Arite. You saw 
;ha: this morning." 

“How did vou catch him?" interrupted the Very Young 
Mul 

“Yesterday he came to Arite." said Lylda. “He came 
to speak. With him came fifty others. \\ r ith them too 
care h s wife to speak here, to our women. He thought 
we • jcki do nothing: he defied 11s. There was a fight— 
this rooming—and many were killed. And we brought 
him to the court—you saw." 

I: s a serious situation," said the Doctor. “I had no 

• % 

: uea- 


• "e car. handle it—we must handle it/' said the Chem- 
sn h u: as Lylda says, we cannot kill our own people— 
only as a last desperate measure." 

fc Suppose you wait too long/' suggested the Big Busi¬ 
ness Man. “You say these Targos are gaining strength 
every day. You might have a very bad civil war.” 

’ That was the problem," answered the Chemist. 

hut now. you come said Lylda. “You change it all 
hen you come down to us out of the great beyond. Our 

people, they call you genii of the Master, they-” 

' Oh pee. I never thought of that," murmured the Very 
Young Man. “What do vou think of us?” 

They think you are supernatural beings of course,” 
the Chemist said smiling. “Y et they accept you without 
fear and they look to you and to me for help.” 

Wh s morning, there at the court,” said Lylda, “I 
heard them say that Targo spoke against you. Devils, 
he said. from, the Treat Blue Star, come here with evil 
dor us ail And they believe him, some of them. It was 
for that perhaps they acted as they did before the court. 
In Ante row. many believe in Targo. Arid it is bad, 


- m • oa.0 


9f 


The truth h added the Chemist, “your coming, while 







Lylda’s Plan 195 

ives us unlimited possibilities for commanding the 
rse of events, at the same time has precipitated the 
is. Naturally no one can understand who or what 
you are. And as Lylda says, the Targos undoubtedly are 
telling the people you come to ally yourself with me for 
evil. There will be thousands who will listen to them 
and fear and hate you—especially in some of the other 
cities. ,, 

“What does the king say?” asked the Doctor. 

“We will see him to-morrow. He has been anxiously 
waiting for you. But you must not forget,” the Chemist 
added with a smile, “the king has had little experience 
facing strife or evil-doing of any kind. It was almost 
unknown until recently. It is I, and you, gentlemen, who 
are facing the problem of saving this nation.” 

The Very Young Man’s face was flushed, and his eyes 
sparkled with excitement. “We can do anything we 
like,” he said. “We have the power.” 

“Ay, that is it,” said Lylda. “The power we have. 
But my friend, we cannot use it. Not for strife, for 
death; we cannot.” 

“The execution of Targo will cause more trouble,” said 
the Chemist thoughtfully. “It is bound to make-” 

“When will you put him to death?” asked the Big 
Business Man. 

“To-morrow he dies,” Lylda answered. “To-morrow, 
before the time of sleep.” 

“There will be trouble,” said the Chemist again. “We 
are in no personal danger of course, but, for the people 
who now believe in Targo, I am afraid-” 

“A plan I have made,” said Lylda. She sat forward 
tensely in her chair, brushing her hair back from her face 
with a swift gesture. “A plan I have made. It is the 
only way—I now think—that may be there comes no 
harm to our people. It is that we want to do, if we can.” 





196 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

She spoke eagerly, and without waiting for them 1 
swer, went swiftly on. 

“This drug that you have brought, I shall take it. And 
I shall get big. Oh, not so very big, but big enough to 
' be the height of a man it may be ten times. Then shall 
I talk to the people—I, Lylda—woman of the Master, 
and then shall I tell them that this power, this magic, is 
for good, not for evil, if only they will give up Targo and 
all who are with him.” 

“I will take it with you,” said the Chemist. “Together 
we-•” 

“No, no, my husband. Alone I must do this. Ah, do 
you not know they say these stranger devils with their 
magic come for evil ? And you too, must you not forget, 
once were a stranger just as they. That the people know 
—that they remember. 

“But I—I—Lylda—a woman of the Oroids I am— 
full-blooded Oroid, no stranger. And they will believe 
me—a woman—for they know I cannot lie. 

“I shall tell them I am for good, for kindness, for all 
w r e had, that time before the Malite war, when every one 
was happy. And if they will not believe, if as I say they 
will not do, then shall my power be indeed for evil, and 
all who will obey me not shall die. But they will believe 
—no need will there be to threaten. 

“To many cities I will go. And in them, all of those 
who want to live by Targo’s law will I send to Or log. 
And all in Orlog who believe him not, will I tell to leave, 
and to the other cities go to make their homes. Then 
Orlog shall be Targo’s city. And to-morrow he will not 
die, but go there into Orlog and become their king. For 
I shall say it may be there are some who like his rule of 
evil. Or it may be he is good in different fashion, and 
in time can make us see that his law too, is just and kind. 

“Then shall live in Orlog all who wish to stay, and we 



Lylda’s Plan 197 

watch their rule, but never shall we let them pass be¬ 
yond their borders. For if they do, then shall we kill 
them. 

“All this I can do, my husband, if you but will let me 
try. For me they will believe, a woman, Oroid all of 
blood—for they know women do not lie.” She stopped 
and the fire in her eyes changed to a look of gentle plead¬ 
ing. “If you will but let me try,” she finished. “My 
husband—please.” 

The Chemist glanced at his friends who sat astonished 
by this flow of eager, impassioned words. Then he 
turned again to Lylda’s intent, pleading face, regarding 
her tenderly. “You are very fine, little mother of my 
son,” he said gently, lapsing for a moment into her own 
style of speech. “It could do no harm,” he added 
thoughtfully “and perhaps-” 

“Let her try it,” said the Doctor. “No harm could 
come to her.” 

“No harm to me could come,” said Lylda quickly. 
“And I shall make them believe. I can, because I am a 
woman, and they will know I tell the truth. Ah, you will 
let me try, my husband—please?” 

The Chemist appealed to the others. “They will be¬ 
lieve her, many of them,” he said. “They will leave Or- 
log as she directs. But those in other cities will still hold 
to Targo, they will simply remain silent for a time. 
What their feelings will be or are we cannot tell. Some 
will leave and go to Orlog of course, for Lylda will offer 
freedom of their leader and to secure that they will seem 
to agree to anything. 

“But after all, they are nothing but children at heart, 
most of them. To-day, they might believe in Lylda; to¬ 
morrow Targo could win them again.” 

“He won’t get a chance,” put in the Very Young Man 
quickly. “If she says we kill anybody who talks for 




198 *• The Girl in the Golden Atom 

Targo outside of Orlog, that goes. It’s the only 
isn’t it?” 

“And she might really convince them—or most of 
them,” added the Doctor. 

“You will let me try?" asked Lylda softly. The Chem¬ 
ist nodded. 

Lylda sprang to her feet. Her frail little body was 
trembling with emotion; on her face was a look almost of 
exaltation. 

“You will let me try,” she cried. “Then I shall make 
them believe. Here, now, this very hour, I shall make 
them know the truth. And they, my own people, shall I 
save from sorrow, misery and death.” 

She turned to the Chemist and spoke rapidly. 

“My husband, will you send Oteo now, up into the 
city. Him will you tell to have others spread the news. 
All who desire an end to Targo’s rule, shall come here at 
once. And all too, who in him believe, and who for him 
want freedom, they shall come too. Let Oteo tell them 
magic shall be performed and Lylda will speak with 
them. 

“Make haste, my husband, for now I go to change my 
dress. Not as the Master’s woman will I speak, but as 
Lylda—Oroid woman—woman of the people.” And 
with a flashing glance, she turned and swiftly left the bal¬ 
cony. 


CHAPTER XXIV 


LYLDA ACTS 

^^IHE’LL do it,” the Very Young Man murmured, 

jjstaring at the doorway through which Lylda had 
disappeared. “She can do anything.” 

The Chemist rose to his feet. ‘Til send Oteo. Will 
you wait here gentlemen? And will you have some of 
the drugs ready for Lylda? You have them with you?” 
The men nodded. 

“How about Lylda carrying the drugs?” asked the 
Very Young Man. “And what about her clothes?” 

“I have already made a belt for Lylda and for myself— 
some time ago,” the Chemist answered. “During the 
first year I was here I made several experiments with the 
drugs. I found that almost anything within the immedi¬ 
ate—shall I say influence of the body, will contract with 
it. Almost any garment, even a loose robe will change 
size. You found that to be so to some extent. Those 
belts you wore down ” 

“That’s true,” agreed the Doctor, “there seems to be 
considerable latitude-” 

“I decided,” the Chemist went on, “that immediately 
after your arrival we should all wear the drugs constantly. 
You can use the armpit pouches if you wish; Lylda and 
I will wear these belts I have made.” 

Oteo, the Chemist’s personal servant, a slim youth with 
a bright, intelligent face, listened carefully to his master’s 
directions and then left the house hurriedly, running up 
the street towards the center of the city. Once or twice 

199 





200 


The Girl in the Golden Atom 


he stopped and spoke to passers-by for a moment, gather¬ 
ing a crowd around him each time. 

The Chemist rejoined his friends on the balcony. 
“There will be a thousand people here in half an hour,” he 
said quietly. “I have sent a message to the men in charge 
of the government workshops; they will have their people 
cease work to come here.” 

Lylda appeared in a few moments more. She was 
dressed as the Chemist had seen her first through the 
microscope—in a short, grey skirt reaching from waist to 
knees. Only now she wore also two circular metal discs 
strapped over her breasts. Her hair was unbound and 
fell in masses forward over her shoulders. Around her 
waist was a broad girdle of golden cloth with small 
pouches for holding the chemicals. She took her place 
among the men quietly. 

“See, I am ready,” she said with a smile. “Oteo, you 
have sent him?” The Chemist nodded. 

Lylda turned to the Doctor. “You will tell me, what 
is to do with the drugs?” 

They explained in a few words. By now a consider¬ 
able crowd had gathered before the house, and up the 
street many others were hurrying down. Directly across 
from the entrance to Lylda’s garden, back of the bluff at 
the lake front, was a large open space with a fringe of 
trees at its back. In this open space the crowd was col¬ 
lecting. 

The Chemist rose after a moment and from the roof¬ 
top spoke a few words to the people in the street below. 
They answered him with shouts of applause mingled with 
a hum of murmured anger underneath. The Chemist 
went back to his friends, his face set and serious. 

As he dropped in his chair Lylda knelt on the floor be¬ 
fore him, laying her arms on his knees. “I go to do for 
our people the best I can,” she said softly, looking up 


201 


Lylda Acts 

into his face. “Now I go, but to you I will come back 
soon/’ The Chemist tenderly put his hand upon the 
glossy smoothness of her hair. 

“I go—now,” she repeated, and reached for one of the 
vials under her arm. Holding it in her hand, she stared 
at it a moment, silently, in awe. Then she shuddered like 
a frightened child and buried her face in the Chemist’s 
lap, huddling her little body up close against his legs as if 
for protection. 

The Chemist did not move nor speak, but sat quiet with 
his hand gently stroking her hair. In a moment she 
again raised her face to his. Her long lashes were wet 
with tears, but her lips were smiling. 

“I am ready—now,” she said gently. She brushed her 
tears from her eyes and rose to her feet. Drawing her¬ 
self to her full height, she tossed back her head and flung 
out her arms before her. 

“No one can know I am afraid—but you,” she said. 
“And I—shall forget.” She dropped her arms and stood 
passive. 

“I go now to take the drug—there in the little garden 
behind, where no one can notice. You will come down?” 

The Big Business Man cleared his throat. When he 
spoke his voice was tremulous with emotion. 

“How long will you be gone—Lylda?” he asked. 

The woman turned to him with a smile. “Soon will I 
return, so I believe,” she answered. “I go to Orlog, to 
Raito, and to Tele. But never shall I wait, nor speak 
long, and fast will I walk. . . . Before the time of sleep 
has descended upon us, I shall be here.” 

In the little garden behind the house, out of sight of 
the crowd on the other side, Lylda prepared to take the 
drug. She was standing there, with the four men, when 
Loto burst upon them, throwing himself into his mother's 


arms. 


202 


The Girl in the Golden Atom 


‘‘Oh, mamita, mamita/' he cried, clinging ta her. 
“There in the street outside, they say such terrible 

things- Of you mamita. ‘The master’s woman’ I 

heard one say, ‘She has the evil magic.’ And another 
spoke of Targo. And they say he must not die, or there 
will be death for those who kill him.” 

Lylda held the boy close as he poured out his breathless 
frightened words. 

“No matter, little son,” she said tenderly. “To mamita 
no harm can come—you shall see. Did my father teach 
you well to-day?” 

“But mamita , one man who saw me standing, called 
me an evil name and spoke of you, my mother Lylda. 
And a woman looked with a look I never saw before. I 
am afraid, mamita 

With quivering lips that smiled, Lylda kissed the little 
boy tenderly and gently loosening his hold pushed him 
towards his father. 

“The Master’s son, Loto, never can he be afraid,” she 
said with gentle reproof. “That must you remember— 
always.” 

The little group in the garden close up against the house 
stood silent as Lylda took a few grains of the drug. The 
noise and shouts of the crowd in front were now plainly 
audible. One voice was raised above the others, as 
though someone were making a speech. 

Loto stood beside his father, and the Chemist laid his 
arm across the boy’s shoulder. As Lylda began visibly 
to increase in size, the boy uttered a startled cry. Meet¬ 
ing his mother’s steady gaze he shut his lips tight, and 
stood rigid, watching her with wide, horrified eyes. 

Lylda had grown nearly twice her normal size before 
she spoke. Then, smiling down at the men, she said 
evenly, “From the roof, perhaps, you will watch.” 



Lylda Acts 203 

“You know what to do if you grow too large,” the 
Doctor said huskily. 

“I know, my friend. I thank you all. And good¬ 
bye.” She met the Chemist’s glance an instant. Then 
abruptly she faced about and walking close to the house, 
stood at its further corner facing the lake. 

After a moment's hesitation the Chemist led his friends 
to the roof. As they appeared at the edge of the para¬ 
pet a great shout rolled up from the crowd below. Nearly 
a thousand people had gathered. The street was crowded 
and in the open space beyond they stood in little groups. 
On a slight eminence near the lake bluff, a man stood 
haranguing those around him. He was a short, very 
thickset little man, with very long arms—a squat, ape¬ 
like figure. He talked loudly and indignantly; around 
him perhaps a hundred people stood listening, applauding 
at intervals. 

When the Chemist appeared this man stopped with a 
final phrase of vituperation and a wave of his fist towards 
the house. 

The Chemist stood silent, looking out over the throng. 
“How large is she now?” he asked the Very Young 
Man softly. The Very Young Man ran across the roof to 
its farther corner and was back in an instant. 

“They’ll see her soon—look there.” His friends 
turned at his words. At the corner of the house they 
could just see the top of Lylda’s head above the edge of 
the parapet. As they watched she grew still taller and 
in another moment her forehead appeared. She turned 
her head, and her great eyes smiled softly at them across 
the roof-top. In a few moments more (she had evidently 
stopped growing) with a farewell glance at her husband, 
she stepped around the corner of the house into full vie\y 
of the crowd—a woman over sixty feet tall, standing 


204 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

quietly in the garden with one hand resting upon the 
roof of the house behind her. 

A cry of terror rose from the people as she appeared. 
Most of those in the street ran in fright back into the 
field behind. Then, seeing her standing motionless with 
a gentle smile on her face, they stopped, irresolute. A 
few held their ground, frankly curious and unafraid. 
Others stood sullen and defiant. 

When the people had quieted a little Lylda raised her 
arms in greeting and spoke, softly, yet with a voice that 
carried far away over the field. As she talked the people 
seemed to recover their composure rapidly. Her tre¬ 
mendous size no longer seemed to horrify them. Those 
who obviously at first were friendly appeared now quite 
at ease; the others, with their lessening terror, were visibly 
more hostile. 

Once Lylda mentioned the name of Targo. A scat¬ 
tered shout came up from the crowd; the apelike man 
shouted out something to those near him, and then, leav¬ 
ing his knoll disappeared. 

As Lylda continued, the hostile element in the crowd 
grew more insistent. They did not listen to her now but 
shouted back, in derision and defiance. Then suddenly a 
stone was thrown; it struck Lylda on the breast, hitting 
her metal breastplate with a thud and dropping at her feet. 

As though at a signal a hail of stones flew up from 
the crowd, most of them striking Lylda like tiny pebbles, 
a few of the larger ones bounding against the house, or 
landing on its roof. 

At this attack Lylda abruptly stopped speaking and 
took a step forward menacingly. The hail of stones con¬ 
tinued. Then she turned towards the roof-top, where the 
men and the little boy stood behind the parapet, shelter¬ 
ing themselves from the flying stones. 

“Only one way there is,” said Lylda sadly, in a soft 


Lylda Acts 205 

whisper that they plainly heard above the noise of the 
crowd. “I am sorry, my husband—but I must.” 

A stone struck her shoulder. She faced the crowd 
again; a gentle look of sorrow was in her eyes, but her 
mouth was stern. In the street below at the edge of the 
field the squat little man had reappeared. It was from 
here that most of the stones seemed to come. 

“That man there—by the road-” The Chemist 

pointed. “One of Targo’s-” 

In three swift steps Lylda was across the garden, with 
one foot over the wall into the street. Reaching down 
she caught the man between her huge fingers, and held 
him high over her head an instant so that all might see. 

The big crowd was silent with terror; the man high in 
the air over their heads screamed horribly. Lylda hesi¬ 
tated only a moment more; then she threw back her arm 
and, with a great great sweep, flung her screaming victim 
far out into the lake. 




CHAPTER XXV 


THE ESCAPE OF TARGO 

AM very much afraid it was a wrong move/’ said 
il the Chemist gravely. 

They were sitting in a corner of the roof, talking over 
the situation. Lylda had left the city; the last they had 
seen of her, she was striding rapidly away, over the coun¬ 
try towards Orlog. The street and field before the house 
now was nearly deserted. 

“She had to do it, of course,” the Chemist continued, 

“but to kill Targo’s brother-” 

“I wonder,” began the Big Business Man thoughtfully. 
“It seems to me this disturbance is becoming far more 
serious than we think. It isn’t so much a political issue 
now between your government and the followers of 
Targo, as it is a struggle against those of us who have 
this magic, as they call it.” 

“That’s just the point,” put in the Doctor quickly. 
“They are making the people believe that our power of 

changing size is a menace that-’’ 

“If I had only realized,” said the Chemist. “I thought 
your coming would help. Apparently it was the very 
worst thing that could have happened.” 

“Not for you personally,” interjected the Very Young 
Man. “We're perfectly safe—and Lylda, and Loto.” 
He put his arm affectionately around the boy who sat 
close beside him. “You are not afraid, are you, Loto?” 

“Now I am not,” answered the boy seriously. “But 
this morning, when I left my grandfather, coming 
home-” 


206 





The Escape of Tar go 207 

“You were afraid for your mother. That was it, 
wasn’t it?” finished the Very Young Man. “Does your 
grandfather teach you?” 

“Yes—he, and father, and mother.” 

“I want you to see Lylda’s father,” said the Chemist. 
“There is nothing we can do now until Lylda returns. 
Shall we walk up there?” They all agreed readily. 

“I may go, too?” Loto asked, looking at his father. 

“You have your lessons,” said the Chemist. 

“But, my father, it is so very lonely without mother,” 
protested the boy. 

The Chemist smiled gently. “Afraid, little son, to stay 
with Oteo?” 

“He’s not afraid,” said the Very Young Man stoutly. 

The little boy looked from one to the other of them a 
moment silently. Then, calling Oteo’s name, he ran 
across the roof and down into the house. 

“Five years ago,” said the Chemist, as the child dis¬ 
appeared, “there was hardly such an emotion in this world 
as fear or hate or anger. Now the pendulum is swinging 

to the other extreme. I suppose that’s natural, but-” 

He ended with a sigh, and, breaking his train of thought, 
rose to his feet. “Shall we start?” 

Lylda’s father greeted them gravely, with a dignity, and 
yet obvious cordiality that was quite in accord with his 
appearance. He was a man over sixty. His still luxuri¬ 
ant white hair fell to his shoulders. His face was hair¬ 
less, for in this land all men’s faces were as devoid of 
hair as those of the women. He was dressed in a long, 
flowing robe similar to those his visitors were wearing. 

“Because—you come—I am glad,” he said with a smile, 
as he shook hands in their own manner. He spoke 
slowly, with frequent pauses, as though carefully picking 
his words. “But—an old man—I know not the language 
of you.” 



208 


The Girl in the Golden Atom 


He led them into a room that evidently was his study, 
for in it they saw many strange instruments, and on a 
table a number of loosely bound sheets of parchment that 
were his books. They took the seats he offered and 
looked around them curiously. 

“There is the clock we spoke of,” said the Chemist, in¬ 
dicating one of the larger instruments that stood on a 
pedestal in a corner of the room. “Reoh will explain it 
to you.” 

Their host addressed the Chemist. “From Oteo I hear 
—the news to-day is bad?” he asked with evident concern. 

“I am afraid it is,” the Chemist answered seriously. 

“And Lylda?” 

The Chemist recounted briefly the events of the day. 
“We can only wait until Lylda returns,” he finished. 
“To-morrow we will talk with the king.” 

“Bad it is,” said the old man slowly; “very bad. But— 
we shall see-” 

The Very Young Man had risen to his feet and was 
standing beside the clock. 

“How does it work?” he asked. “What time is it 
now? 

Reoh appealed to his son-in-law. “To tell of it—the 
words I know not.” 

The Chemist smiled. “You are too modest, my father. 
But I will help you out, if you insist.” He turned to the 
others, who were gathered around him, looking at the 
clock. 

“Our measurement of our time here,” he began, “like 
yours, is based on-” 

“Excuse me,” interrupted the Very Young Man. “I 
just want to know first what time it is now?” 

“It is in the fourth eclipse,” said the Chemist with a 
twinkle. 

The Very Young Man was too surprised by this unex- 




The Escape of Tar go 209 

pected answer to question further, and the Chemist went 
on. 

“We measure time by the astronomical movements, just 
as you do in your world. One of the larger stars has a 
satellite which revolves around it with extreme rapidity. 
Here at Arite, this satellite passes nearly always directly 
behind its controlling star. In other words, it is eclipsed. 
Ten of these eclipses measure the passage of cur day. 
We rise generally at the first eclipse or about that time. 
It is now the fourth eclipse; you would call it late after¬ 
noon. Do you see?” 

“How is the time gauged here?” asked the Big Business 
Man, indicating the clock. 

The instrument stood upon a low stone pedestal. It 
consisted of a transparent cylinder about twelve inches in 
diameter and some four feet high, surmounted by a large 
circular bowl. The cylinder was separated from the bowl 
by a broad disc of porous stone; a similar stone section 
divided the cylinder horizontally into halves. From the 
bowl a fluid was dropping in a tiny stream through the 
top stone segment into the upper compartment, which was 
now about half full. This in turn filtered through the 
second stone into the lower compartment. This lower 
section was marked in front with a large number of fine 
horizontal lines, an equal distance apart, but of unequal 
length. In it the fluid stood now just above one of the 
longer lines—the fourth from the bottom. On the top 
of this fluid floated a circular disc almost the size of the 
inside diameter of the cylinder. 

The Chemist explained. “It really is very much like 
the old hour-glass we used to have in your world. This 
filters liquid instead of sand. You will notice the water 
filters twice.” He indicated the two compartments. 
“That is because it is necessary to have a liquid that is 
absolutely pure in order that the rate at which it filters 


210 


The Girl in the Golden Atom 


through this other stone may remain constant. The clock 
is carefully tested, so that for each eclipse the water will 
rise in this lower part of the cylinder, just the distance 
from here to here.” 

The Chemist put his fingers on two of the longer marks. 

“Very ingenious,” remarked the Doctor. “Is it ac¬ 
curate?” 

“Not so accurate as your watches, of course,” the 
Chemist answered. “But still, it serves the purpose. 
These ten longer lines, you see, mark the ten eclipses that 
constitute one of our days. The shorter lines between 
indicate halves and quarter intervals.” 

“Then it is only good for one day?” asked the Very 
Young Man. “How do you set it?” 

“It resets automatically each day, at the beginning of 
the first eclipse. This disc,” the Chemist pointed to the 
disc floating on the water in the lower compartment. 
“This disc rises with the water on which it is floating. 
When it reaches the top of it, it comes in contact with a 
simple mechanism—you’ll see it up there—which opens a 
gate below and drains out the water in a moment. So 
that every morning it is emptied and starts filling up again. 
All that is needed is to keep this bowl full of water.” 

“It certainly seems very practical,” observed the Big 
Business Man. “Are there many in use?” 

“Quite a number, yes. This clock was invented by 
Reoh, some thirty years ago. He is the greatest scientist 
and scholar we have.” The old man smiled deprecatingly 
at this compliment. 

“Are these books?” asked the Very Young Man; he 
had wandered over to the table and was fingering one of 
the bound sheets of parchment. 

“They are Reoh's chronicles,” the Chemist answered. 
“The only ones of their kind in Arite.” 


211 


The Escape of Tar go 

“What’s this?” The Very Young Man pointed to an¬ 
other instrument. 

“That is an astronomical instrument, something like a 
sextant—also an invention of Reoh’s. Here is a small 

telescope and-” The Chemist paused and went over 

to another table standing at the side of the room. 

“That reminds me, gentlemen,” he continued; “I have 
something here in which you will be greatly interested.” 

“What you—will see,” said Reoh softly, as they 
gathered around the Chemist, “you only, of all people, can 
understand. Each day I look, and I wonder; but never 
can I quite believe.” 

“I made this myself, nearly ten years ago,” said the 
Chemist, lifting up the instrument; “a microscope. It is 
not very large, you see; nor is it very powerful. But I 
want you to look through it.” With his cigar-lighter he 
ignited a short length of wire that burned slowly with a 
brilliant blue spot of light. In his hand he held a small 
piece of stone. 

“I made this microscope hoping that I might prove 
with it still more conclusively my original theory of the 
infinite smallness of human life. For many months I 
searched into various objects, but without success. 
Finally I came upon this bit of rock.” The Chemist ad¬ 
justed it carefully under the microscope with the light 
shining brilliantly upon it. 

“You see I have marked one place; I am going to let 
you look into it there.” 

The Doctor stepped forward. As he looked they heard 
his quick intake of breath. After a moment he raised 
his head. On his face was an expression of awe too deep 
for words. He made place for the others, and stood 
silent. 

When the Very Young Man’s turn came he looked into 



212 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

the eyepiece awkwardly. His heart was beating fast; for 
some reason he felt frightened. 

At first he saw nothing. “Keep the other eye open,” 
said the Chemist. 

The Very Young Man did as he was directed. After 
a moment there appeared before him a vast stretch of 
open country. As from a great height he stared down at 
the scene spread out below him. Gradually it became 
clearer. He saw water, with the sunlight—his own kind 
of sunlight it seemed—shining upon it. He stared for a 
moment more, dazzled by the light. Then, nearer to him, 
he saw a grassy slope, that seemed to be on a mountain¬ 
side above the water. On this slope he saw animals graz¬ 
ing, and beside them a man, formed like himself. 

The Chemist’s voice came to him from far away. “We 
are all of us here in a world that only occupies a portion 
of one little atom of the gold of a wedding-ring. Yet 
what you see there in that stone-” 

The Very Young Man raised his head. Before him 
stood the microscope, with its fragment of stone gleam¬ 
ing in the blue light of the burning wire. He wanted to 
say something to show them how he felt, but no words 
came. He looked up into the Chemist’s smiling face, and 
smiled back a little foolishly. 

“Every day I look,’’ said Reoh, breaking the silence. 
“And I see—wonderful things. But never really—can I 
believe.” 

At this moment there came a violent rapping upon the 
outer door. As Reoh left the room to open it, the Very 
Young Man picked up the bit of stone that the Chemist 
had just taken from the microscope. 

“I wish—may I keep it?” he asked impulsively. 

The Chemist smiled and nodded, and the Very Young 
Man was about to slip it into the pocket of his robe when 
Reoh hastily reentered the room, followed by Oteo. The 



The Escape of Tar go 213 

youth was breathing heavily, as though he had been run¬ 
ning, and on his face was a frightened look. 

“Bad; very bad,” said the old man, in a tone of deep 
concern, as they came through the doorway. 

“What is it, Oteo?” asked the Chemist quickly. The 
boy answered him with a flood of words in his native 
tongue. 

The Chemist listened quietly. Then he turned to his 
companions. 

“Targo has escaped,” he said briefly. “They sent word 
to me at home, and Oteo ran here to tell me. A crowd 
broke into the court-house and released him. Oteo says 
they went away by water, and that no one is following 
them.” 

The youth, who evidently understood English, added 
something else in his own language. 

“He says Targo vowed death to all who have the 
magic power. He spoke in the city just now, and prom¬ 
ised them deliverance from the giants.” 

“Good Lord,” murmured the Very Young Man. 

“He has gone to Or log probably,” the Chemist con¬ 
tinued. “We have nothing to fear for the moment. But 
that he could speak, in the centre of Arite, after this morn¬ 
ing, and that the people would listen-” 

“It seems to me things are getting worse every minute,” 
said the Big Business Man. 

Oteo spoke again. The Chemist translated. “The po¬ 
lice did nothing. They simply stood and listened, but 
took no part.” 

“Bad; very bad,” repeated the old man, shaking his 
head. 

“What we should do I confess I cannot tell,” said the 
Chemist soberly. “But that we should do something 
drastic is obvious.” 

“We can’t do anything until Lylda gets back,” declared 



214 77 j £ Girl in the Golden Atom 

the Very Young Man. “We’ll see what she has done. 
We might have had to let Targo go anyway.” 

The Chemist started towards the door. “To-night, by 
the time of sleep, Reoh,” he said to the old man, “I ex¬ 
pect Lylda will have returned. You had better come to 
us then with Aura. I do not think you should stay here 
alone to sleep to-night.” 

“In a moment—Aura comes,” Reoh answered. “We 
shall be with you—very soon.” 

The Chemist motioned to his companions, and with ob¬ 
vious reluctance on the part of the Very Young Man they 
left, followed by Oteo. 

On the way back the city seemed quiet—abnormally so. 
The streets were nearly deserted; what few pedestrians 
they met avoided them, or passed them sullenly. They 
were perhaps half-way back to the Chemist’s house when 
the Very Young Man stopped short. 

“I forgot that piece of stone,” he explained, looking at 
them queerly. “Go on. I’ll be there by the time you 
are,” and disregarding the Chemist’s admonition that he 
might get lost he left them abruptly and walked swiftly 
back over the way they had come. 

Without difficulty, for they had made few turns, the 
Very Young Man located Reoh’s house. As he ap¬ 
proached he noticed the figure of a man lounging against 
a further corner of the building; the figure disappeared 
almost as soon as he saw it. 

It was a trivial incident, but, somehow, to the Very 
Young Man, it held something in it of impending danger. 
He did not knock on the outer door, but finding it partly 
open, he slowly pushed it wider and stepped quietly into 
the hallway beyond. He was hardly inside when there 
came from within the house a girl’s scream—a cry of 
horror, abruptly stifled. 

For an instant, the Very Young Man stood hesitating. 


The Escape of Tar go 215 

Then he dashed forward through an open doorway in the 
direction from which the cry had seemed to come. 

The room into which he burst was Reoh’s study; the 
room he had left only a few moments before. On the 
floor, almost across his path, lay the old man, with the 
short blade of a sword buried to the hilt in his breast. In 
a corner of the room a young Oroid girl stood with her 
back against the wall. Her hands were pressed against 
her mouth; her eyes were wide with terror. Bending 
over the body on the floor with a hand at its armpit, knelt 
the huge, gray figure of a man. At the sound of the in¬ 
truder’s entrance he looked up quickly and sprang to his 
feet. 

The Very Young Man saw it was Targo! 


CHAPTER XXVI 


THE ABDUCTION 

W HEN the Very Young Man left them so uncere¬ 
moniously the Chemist and his companions con¬ 
tinued on their way home, talking earnestly over the seri¬ 
ous turn affairs had taken. Of the three, the Big Busi¬ 
ness Man appeared the most perturbed. 

“Lylda isn’t going to accomplish anything,” he said. 
“It won’t work. The thing has gone too far. It isn’t 
politics any longer; it’s a struggle against us—a hatred 
and fear of our supernatural powers.” 

“If we had never come-” began the Doctor. 

“It probably would have worked out all right,” finished 

the Big Business Man. “But since we’re here-” 

“We could leave,” the Doctor suggested. 

“It has gone too far; I agree with you,” the Chemist 
said. “Your going would not help. They would never 
believe I did not still possess the magic. And now, with¬ 
out the drugs I might not be able to cope with affairs. It 
is a very serious situation.” 

“And getting worse all the time,” added the Big Busi¬ 
ness Man. 

When they arrived at the Chemist's home Loto did not 
run out to meet them as the Chemist expected. They 
called his name, but there was no answer. Inside the 
house they perceived at once that something was wrong. 
The living-room was in disorder; some of the pieces of 
furniture had been overturned, and many of the smaller 
articles were scattered about the floor. Even the wall- 
hangings had been torn down. 

216 





The Abduction 


217 

In sudden fear the Chemist ran through the building, 
calling to Loto. Everywhere he saw evidence of in¬ 
truders, who had ransacked the rooms, as though making 
a hasty search. In one of the rooms, crouched on the 
floor, he came upon Eena, Lylda’s little serving-maid. 
The girl was stricken dumb with terror. At the sight of 
her master she sobbed with relief, and after a few mo¬ 
ments told him what had happened. 

When the Chemist rejoined his friends in the lower 
room his face was set and white. The girl followed him 
closely, evidently afraid to be left alone. The Chemist 
spoke quietly, controlling his emotion with obvious diffi¬ 
culty. 

“Loto has been stolen!” he said. “Targo and four of 
his men were here soon after we left. Eena saw them 
and hid. They searched the house-” 

“For the drugs,” muttered the Doctor under his breath. 
, “-and then left, taking Loto with them.” 

“Which way did they go?” asked the Big Business 
Man. “Good God, what a thing!” 

“They went by water, in a large boat that was waiting 
for them here,” answered the Chemist. 

“How long ago?” asked the Doctor quickly. “We 
have not been gone very long.” 

“An hour probably, not much more.” Eena said 
something to her master and began to cry softly. 

“She says they left a little while ago. Three of the 
men took Loto away in the boat. She watched them 
from the window upstairs.” 

“Targo alia/’ said the girl. 

“One of the men was Targo,” said the Chemist. He 
went to one of the windows overlooking the lake; the 
Doctor stood beside him. There was no boat in sight. 

“They cannot have got very far,” said the Doctor. 
“Those islands there-” 





2 i 8 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

“They would take him to Orlog,” said the Chemist. 
“About fifty miles.” 

The Doctor turned back to the room. “We can get 
them. You forget—these drugs—the power they give us. 
Oh, Will.” He called the Big Business Man over to 
them; he spoke hurriedly, with growing excitement. 
“What do you think, Will? That boat—they’ve got 
Loto—it can’t be very far. We can make ourselves so 
large in half an hour we can wade all over the lake. We 
can get it. What do you think?” 

The Chemist dropped into a chair with his head in his 
hands. “Let me think—just a moment, Frank. I know 
the power we have; I know we can do almost anything. 
That little boy of mine—they’ve got him. Let me think 
—just a moment.” 

He sat motionless. The Doctor continued talking in a 
lower tone to the Big Business Man by the window. In 
the doorway Oteo stood like a statue, motionless, except 
for his big, soft eyes that roved unceasingly over the 
scene before him. After a moment Eena ceased her sob¬ 
bing and knelt beside the Chemist, looking up at him 
sorrowfully. 

“I cannot believe,” said the Chemist finally, raising his 
head, “that the safest way to rescue Loto is by the plan 
you have suggested.” He spoke with his usual calm, 
judicial manner, having regained control of himself com¬ 
pletely. “I understand now, thoroughly, and for the first 
time, the situation we are facing. It is, as you say, a 
political issue no longer. Targo and his closest followers 
have convinced a very large proportion of our entire na¬ 
tion, I am certain, that myself, and my family, and you, 
the strangers, are possessed of a diabolical power that 
must be annihilated. Targo will never rest until he has 
the drugs. That is why he searched this house. 

“He has abducted Loto for the same purpose. He will 


The Abduction 


219 

—not hurt Loto—I am convinced of that. Probably he 
will send someone to-morrow to demand the drugs as the 
price of Loto’s life. But don’t you understand? Targo 
and his advisers, and even the most ignorant of the peo¬ 
ple, realize what power we have. Lylda showed them 
that when she flung Targo’s brother out into the lake 
to-day. But we cannot use this power openly. For, 
while it makes us invincible, it makes them correspond¬ 
ingly desperate. They are a peculiar people. Through¬ 
out the whole history of the race they have been kindly, 
thoughtless children. Now they are aroused. The pen¬ 
dulum has swung to the other extreme. They care little 
for their lives. They are still children—children who will 
go to their death unreasoning, fighting against invin¬ 
cibility. 

“That is something we must never overlook, for it is a 
fact. We cannot run amuck as giants over this world and 
hope to conquer it. We could conquer it, yes; but only 
when the last of its inhabitants had been killed; stamped 
out like ants defending their hill from the attacks of an 
elephant. Don’t you see I am right?” 

“Then Lylda-” began the Doctor, as the Chemist 

paused. 

“Lylda will fail. Her venture to-day will make matters 
immeasureably worse.” 

“You’re right,” agreed the Big Business Man. “We 
should have realized.” 

“So you see we cannot make ourselves large and re¬ 
capture Loto by force. They would anticipate us and 
kill him.” 

“Then what shall we do?” demanded the Doctor. “We 
must do something.” 

“That we must decide carefully, for we must make no 
more mistakes. But we can do nothing at this moment. 
The lives of all of us are threatened. We must not al- 



220 


The Girl in the Golden Atom 


low ourselves to become separated. We must wait here 
for Lylda. Reoh and Aura must stay with us. Then we 
can decide how to rescue Loto and what to do after that. 
But we must keep together/’ 

“Jack ought to be here by now,” said the Big Business 
Man. “I hope Reoh and Aura corrfe with him.” 

For over an hour they waited, and still the Very Young 
Man did not come. They had just decided to send Oteo 
to see what had become of him and to bring down Reoh 
and his daughter, when Lylda unexpectedly returned. It 
was Eena, standing at one of the side windows, who first 
saw her mistress. A cry from the girl brought them all 
to the window. Far away beyond the city they could see 
the gigantic figure of Lylda, towering several hundred feet 
in the air. 

As she came closer she seemed to stop, near the out¬ 
skirts of the city, and then they saw her dwindling in size 
'until she disappeared, hidden from their view by the 
houses near at hand. 

In perhaps half an hour more she reappeared, picking 
her way carefully down the deserted street towards them. 
She was at this time about forty feet tall. At the corner, 
a hundred yards away from them a little group of people 
ran out, and, with shouts of anger, threw something at 
her as she passed. 

She stooped down towards them, and immediately they 
scurried for safety out of her reach. 

Once inside of her own garden, where the Chemist and 
his companions were waiting, Lylda lost no time in be¬ 
coming her normal size again. As she grew smaller, she 
sat down with her back against a little tree. Her face 
was white and drawn; her eyes were full of tears as she 
looked at her husband and his friends. 

When the drug had ceased to act, the Chemist sat beside 
her. She had started out only a few hours before a cru- 


The Abduction 


221 


sader, dominant, forceful; she came back now, a tired, dis¬ 
couraged little woman. The Chemist put his arm around 
her protectingly, drawing her drooping body towards him. 
“Very bad news, Lylda, we know,” he said gently. 

“Oh, my husband,” she cried brokenly. “So sorry I 
am—so very sorry. The best I knew I did. And it was 

all so very bad—so very bad-” she broke off abruptly, 

looking at him with her great, sorrowful eyes. 

“Tell us Lylda,” he said softly. 

“To many cities I went,” she answered. “And I told 
the people all I meant to say. Some of them believed. 
But they were not many, and of the others who did not 
believe, they were afraid, and so kept they silent. Then 
into Orlog I went, and in the public square I spoke—for 
very long, because, for some reason I know not, at first 
they listened. 

“But no one there believed. And then, my husband, 
at last I knew why I could not hope to gain my way. It 
is not because they want Targo’s rule that they oppose us. 
It was, but it is so no longer. It is because they have 
been made to fear these drugs we have. For now, in Or¬ 
log, they are shouting death to all the giants. Forgotten 
are all their cries for land—the things that Targo prom¬ 
ised, and we in Arite would not give. It is death to all 
the giants they are shouting now: death to you, to me, to 
us all, because we have these drugs.” 

“Did they attack you?” asked the Big Business Man. 

“Many things they threw,” Lylda answered. “But I 
was so big,” she smiled a little sad, twisted smile. “What 
they could do was as nothing. And because of that they 
fear and hate us so; yet never have I seen such fearless 
things as those they did. Death to the giants was their 
only cry. And I could have killed them—hundreds, thou¬ 
sands—yet never could I have made them stop while yet 
they were alive. 



222 


The Girl in the Golden Atom 


“I told them Targo I would free. And in Orlog they 
laughed. For they said that he would free himself before 
I had returned.” 

“He did,” muttered the Big Business Man. 

“Targo escaped this afternoon,” the Chemist explained. 

“He went to Orlog by boat and took-” He stopped 

abruptly. “Come into the house, Lylda,” he added 
gently; “there are other things, my wife, of which we 
must speak.” He rose to his feet, pulling her up with 
him. 

“Where is Jack,” she asked, looking at the Big Business 
Man, who stood watching her gravely. “And where is 
Loto? Does he not want to see his mother who tried 

so-” She put her arms around the Chemist’s neck. 

“So very hard I tried,” she finished softly. “So very 
hard, because—I thought-” 

The Chemist led her gently into the house. The Doc¬ 
tor started to follow, but the Big Business Man held him 
back. “It is better not,” he said in an undertone, “don’t 
you think?” Oteo was standing near them, and the Big 
Business Man motioned to him. “Besides,” he added, 
“I’m worried about Jack. I think we ought to go up 
after him. I don’t think it ought to take us very long.” 

“With Oteo—he knows the way,” agreed the Doctor. 
“It’s devilish strange what’s keeping that boy.” 

They found that although Oteo spoke only a few words 
of English, he understood nearly everything they said, 
and waiting only a moment more, they started up into the 
city towards Reoh’s home. 

In the living-room of the house, the Chemist sat Lylda 
gently down on a cushion in front of the hearth. Sitting 
beside her, he laid his hand on hers that rested on her 
knee. 

“For twelve years, Lylda, we have lived together,” he 
began slowly. “And no sorrow has come to us; no dan- 





The Abduction 


223 

ger has threatened us or those we loved.” He met his 
wife’s questioning gaze unflinchingly and went on: 

“You have proved yourself a wonderful woman, my 
wife. You never knew—nor those before you—the con¬ 
flict of human passions. No danger before has ever 
threatened you or those you loved.” He saw her eyes 
grow wider. 

“Very strange you talk, my husband. There is some¬ 
thing-” 

“There is something, Lylda. To-day you have seen 
strife, anger, hate and—and death. You have met them 
all calmly; you have fought them all justly, like a woman 
—a brave, honest Oroid woman, who can wrong no one. 
There is something now that I must tell you.” He saw 
the growing fear in her eyes and hurried on. 

“Loto, to-day—this afternoon-” 

The woman gave a little, low cry of anguish, instantly 
repressed. Her hand gripped his tightly. 

“No, no, Lylda, not that,” he said quickly, “but this 
afternoon while we were all away—Loto was here alone 
with Eena—Targo with his men came. They did not 
hurt Loto; they took him away in a boat to Orlog.” He 
stopped abruptly. Lylda’s eyes never left his face. Her 
breath came fast; she put a hand to her mouth and stifled 
the cry that rose to her lips. 

“They will not hurt him, Lylda; that I know. And 
soon we will have him back.” 

For a moment more her searching eyes stared steadily 
into his. He heard the whispered words, “My little son 
—with Targo,” come slowly from her lips; then with a 
low, sobbing cry she dropped senseless into his arms. 




/ 


CHAPTER XXVII 

AURA 

T HE Very Young Man involuntarily took a step 
backward as he met Targo’s eyes, glaring at him 
across the old man’s body. The girl in the corner gave 
another cry—a cry of fright and horror, yet with a note 
of relief. The Very Young Man found himself wonder¬ 
ing who she was; then he knew. 

His first impulse was to leap across the room towards 
her. He thought of the chemicals and instinctively his 
hand went to his arm-pit. But he knew there was no 
time for that. He hesitated one brief instant. As he 
stood rigid Targo stooped swiftly and grasped the dagger 
in his victim’s breast. 

The girl screamed again, louder this time, and like a 
mask the Very Young Man’s indecision fell from him. 
He stood alert, clear-headed. Here was an enemy threat¬ 
ening him—an enemy he must fight and overcome. 

In the second that Targo bent down the Very Young 
Man bounded forward, and with a leap that his football 
days had taught him so well how to make, he landed 
squarely upon the bare, broad back of his antagonist. 
The impact of his weight forced Targo down upon the 
floor, and losing his balance he fell, with the Very Young 
Man on top of him. They hit the leg of the table as they 
rolled over, and something dropped from it to the floor, 
striking the stone surface with a thud. 

The knife still stuck in the dead man’s body. The 

Very Young Man thought he could reach it, but his op- 

224 


Aura 


225 

ponent’s great arms were around him now and held him 
too tightly. He tried to pull himself loose, but could 
not. Then he rolled partly over again, and met Tar go’s 
eyes above, leering triumphantly down at him. He 
looked away and wrenched his right arm free. Across 
the room he could see the girl still crouching in the corner. 
His right hand sweeping along the floor struck something 
heavy lying there. His fingers closed over it; he raised it 
up, and hardly knowing what he did, crashed it against his 
enemy’s head. 

He felt the tense muscles of the man relax, and then the 
weight of his inert body as it pressed down upon him. 
He wriggled free, and sprang to his feet. As he stood 
weak and trembling, looking down at the unconscious 
form of Targo lying upon the floor, the girl suddenly ran 
over and stood beside him. Her slim little body came 
only a little above his shoulder; instinctively he put his 
arm about her. 

A voice, calling from outside the room, made the girl 
look up into his face with new terror. 

“Others are coming.” she whispered tensely and hud¬ 
dled up against him. 

The Very Young Man saw that the room had two 
doors—the one through which he had entered, and an¬ 
other in one of its other walls. There were no windows. 
He pulled the girl now towards the further door, but she 
held him back. 

“They come that way,” she whispered. 

Another voice sounded behind him and the Very Young 
Man knew that a man was coming up along the passage¬ 
way from the front entrance. Targo’s men! He remem¬ 
bered now the skulking figure he had seen outside the 
house. There were more than two, for now he heard 
other voices, and some one calling Targo’s name. 

He held the girl closer and stood motionless. Like rats 



226 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

in a trap, he thought. He felt the fingers of his right 
hand holding something heavy. It was a piece of stone— 
the stone he had looked at through the microscope—the 
stone with which he had struck Targo. He smiled to 
himself, and slipped it into his pocket. 

The girl had slowly pulled him over to the inner wall 
of the room. The footsteps came closer. They would 
be here in a moment. The Very Young Man wondered 
how he should fight them all; then he thought of the knife 
that was still in the murdered man’s body. He thought 
he ought to get it now while there was still time. 
He heard a click and the wall against which he and the 
girl were leaning yielded with their weight. A door 
swung open—a door the Very Young Man had not seen 
before. The girl pulled him through the doorway, and 
swung the door softly closed behind them. 

The Very Young Man found himself now in a long, 
narrow room with a very high ceiling. It had, ap¬ 
parently, no other door, and no windows. It was evi¬ 
dently a store-room—piled high with what looked like 
boxes, and with bales of silks and other fabrics. 

The Very Young Man looked around him hastily. 
Then he let go of the girl, and, since locks were unknown 
in this world, began piling as many heavy objects as pos¬ 
sible against the door. The girl tried to help him, but he 
pushed her away. Once he put his ear to the door and 
listened. He heard voices outside in the strange Oroid 
tongue. 

The girl stood beside him. “They are lifting Targo 
up. He speaks; he is not dead,” she whispered. 

For several minutes they stood there listening. The 
voices continued in a low murmur. “They’ll know we 
are in here,” said the Very Young Man finally, in an 
undertone. “Is there any other way out of this room?” 

The girl shook her head. The Very Young Man for- 



Aura 


227 


got the import of her answer, and suddenly found himself 
thinking she was the prettiest girl he had ever seen. She 
was hardly more than sixteen, with a slender, not yet 
matured, yet perfectly rounded little body. She wore, 
like Lylda, a short blue silk tunic, with a golden cord 
crossing her breast and encircling her waist. Her raven 
black hair hung in two twisted locks nearly to her knees. 
Her skin was very white and, even more than Lylda's, 
gleamed with iridescent color. 

“Only this one door,” said the girl. The words 
brought the Very Young Man to himself with a start. 

No other way out of the room! He knew that Targo 
and his men would force their way in very soon. He 
could not prevent them. But it would take time. The 
Very Young Man remembered that now he had time to 
take the chemicals. He put his hand to his armpit and 
felt the pouch that held the drug. He wondered which to 
take. The ceiling was very high; but to fight in the 
narrow confines of such a room—*— 

He led the girl over to a pile of cushions and sat down 
beside her. 

“Listen,” he said briefly. “We are going to take a 
medicine; it will make us very small. Then we will hide 
from Targo and his men till they are gone. This is not 
magic; it is science. Do you understand?” 

“I understand,” the girl answered readily. “One of 
the strangers you are—my brother’s friend.” 

“You will not be afraid to take the drug 

“No.” But though she spoke confidently, she drew 
closer to him and shivered a little. 

The Very Young Man handed her one of the tiny pel¬ 
lets. “Just touch it to the tip of your tongue as I do,” 
he said warningly. 

They took the drug. When it had ceased to act, they 
found themselves standing on the rough uneven stone sur- 



228 


The Girl in the Golden Atom 


face that was the floor of the room. Far overhead in the 
dim luminous blackness they could just make out the 
great arching ceiling, stretching away out of sight down 
the length of the room. Beside them stood a tremen¬ 
dous shaggy pile of coarsely woven objects that were the 
silk pillows on which they had been sitting a moment be¬ 
fore—pillows that seemed forty or fifty feet square now 
and loomed high above their heads. 

The Very Young Man took the frightened girl by the 
hand and led her along the tremendous length of a pile of 
boxes, blocks long it seemed. These boxes, from their 
size, might have been rectangular, windowless houses, 
jammed closely together, and piled one upon the other up 
into the air almost out of sight. 

Finally they came to a broad passageway between the 
boxes—a mere crack it would have been before. They 
turned into it, and, a few feet beyond, came to a larger 
square space with a box making a roof over it some 
twenty feet above their heads. 

From this retreat they could see the lower part of the 
door leading into the other room and could hear from be¬ 
yond it a muffled roar—the voices of Targo and his men. 
Hardly were they hidden when the door opened a little. 
It struck against the bales the Very Young Man had piled 
against it. For a moment it held, but with the united 
efforts of the men pushing from the other side, it slowly 
yielded and swung open. 

Targo stepped into the room. To the Very Young 
Man he seemed nearly a hundred feet high. Only his 
feet and ankles were visible at first, from where the Very 
Young Man was watching. Three other men came with 
him. They stamped back and forth for a time, moving 
some of the bales and boxes. Luckily they left undis¬ 
turbed those nearest the fugitives; after a moment they 
left, leaving the door open. 


Aura 


229 

The Very Young Man breathed a long sigh of relief. 
“Gosh, I’m glad that’s over/’ He spoke in a low tone, 
although the men in the other room seemed so far away 
they would hardly have heard him if he had shouted at the 
top of his voice. 

Alone with the girl now in this great silent room, the 
Very Young Man felt suddenly embarrassed. “I am 
one of your brother’s friends,” he said. “My name’s 
Jack; is yours Aura?” 

“Lylda’s sister I am,” she answered quietly. “My 

father told me about you-” Then with a rush came 

the memory of her father’s death, which the startling 
experiences of the past half-hour had made her forget. 
Her big, soft eyes filled with tears and her lips quivered. 
Involuntarily the Very Young Man put his arm about 
her again and held her close to him. She was so little 
and frail—so pathetic and so wholly adorable. For a 
long time they sat in silence; then the girl gently drew 
away. 

At the doorway they stood and listened; Targo and his 
followers were still in the adjoining room, talking ear¬ 
nestly. “Loto they have captured,” Aura whispered sud¬ 
denly. “Others of Targo’s men have taken him—in a 
boat—to Orlog. To-morrow they send a messenger to 
my brother to demand he give up these drugs—or Loto 
they will kill.” 

The Very Young Man waited, breathless. Suddenly 
he heard Targo laugh—a cruel, cynical laugh. Aura 
shuddered. 

“And when he has the drug, all of us will he kill. 
And all in the land too who will not do as he bids.” 

The men were rising, evidently in preparation to leave. 
Aura continued: “They go—now—to Orlog—all but 
Targo. A little way from here, up the lake shore, a 
boat is waiting. It will take them there fast.” 



230 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

With a last look around, Targo and his followers dis¬ 
appeared through the back door of the room. An outer 
door clanged noisily, and the Very Young Man and Aura 
were left alone in the house. 

Reoh murdered, Loto stolen! The Very Young Man 
thought of Lylda and wondered if anything could have 
happened to her. “Did they speak of your sister ?” he 
asked. 

“Targo said—he—he would put her to death,” Aura 
answered with a shudder. “He said—she killed his 
brother to-day.” She turned to the Very Young Man im¬ 
pulsively, putting her little hands up on his shoulders. 
“Oh, my friend,” she exclaimed. “You can do some¬ 
thing to save my family? Targo is so strong, so cruel. 
My father-” She stopped, and choked back a sob. 

“Did they say where Lylda was now?” 

“They did not know. She grew very big and went 
away.” 

“Where is your brother and my two friends?” 

“Targo said they were here when he—he took Loto. 
Now they have gone home. He was afraid of them*— 
now—because they have the drugs.” 

“To-morrow they are going to send a messenger from 
Orlog to demand the drugs?” 

“He said to-morrow. Oh, you will do something for 
us? You can save Loto?” 

The Very Young Man was beginning to formulate a 
plan. “And to-night,” he asked, “from what'they said 
—are you sure they will not hurt Loto?” 

“They said no. But he is so little—so-” The girl 

burst into tears, and at every sob the Very Young Man’s 
heart leaped in his breast. He wanted to comfort her, but 
he could think of no word to say; he wanted to help her 
—to do the best thing in what he saw was a grave crisis. 
What he should have done was to have taken her back to 




Aura 


231 


the Chemist and his friends, and then with them planned 
the rescue of Loto. But with the girl’s hands upon his 
shoulders, and her sorrowful little tear-stained face look¬ 
ing up to his, he did not think of that. He thought only 
of her and her pathetic appeal. “You will do something, 
my friend? You can save Loto?” He could save 
Loto! With the power of the drugs he could do any¬ 
thing! 

The Very Young Man made a sudden decision. “I 
don’t know the way to Orlog; you do ?” he asked abruptly. 

“Oh yes, I know it well.” 

“We will go to Orlog, you and I—now, and rescue 
Loto. You will not be afraid?” 

The girl’s eyes looked into his with a clear, steady gaze. 
The Very Young Man stared down into their depths with 
his heart pounding. “I shall not be afraid—with you,” 
said the girl softly. 

The Very Young Man drew a long breath. He knew 
he must think it all out carefully. The drug would make 
them very large, and in a short time they could walk to 
Orlog. No harm could come to them. Once in Orlog 
they would find Loto—probably in Targo’s palace—and 
bring him back with them. The Very Young Man 
pictured the surprise and gratification of the Chemist and 
his friends. Lylda would be back by then; no sooner 
would she have heard of Lotos loss than he would bring 
him back to her. Or perhaps they would meet Lylda and 
she would join them. 

The Very Young Man produced the drug and was 
about to give Aura one of the pellets when another 
thought occurred to him. Targo would not harm Loto 
now because he was valuable as a hostage. But suppose 
he saw these two giants coming to the rescue? The Very 
Young Man knew that probably the boy would be killed 
before he could save him. That way would not do. He 


The Girl in the Golden Atom 


232 

would have to get to Or log unseen—rescue Loto by a sud¬ 
den rush, before they could harm him. 

But first it would be necessary for him and Aura to get 
out of Arite quietly without causing any excitement. 
Once in the open country they could grow larger and 
travel rapidly to Orlog. The Very Young Man thought 
it would be best to be normal size while leaving Arite. 
He explained his plan to Aura briefly. 

It took several successive tastes of the different drugs 
before this result was accomplished, but in perhaps half an 
hour they were ready to leave the house. To the Very 
Young Man this change of size was no longer even star¬ 
tling. Aura, this time, with him beside her, seemed 
quite unafraid. 

“Now we’re ready,” said the Very Young Man, in a 
matter-of-fact tone that was far from indicating his 
true feeling. “Take the way where we are least likely to 
be noticed—towards Orlog. When we get in the open 
country we can get bigger.” 

He led the girl across Reoh’s study. She kept her face 
averted as they passed the body lying on the floor, and in 
a moment they were outside the house. They walked 
rapidly, keeping close to the walls of the houses. The 
streets were nearly deserted and no one seemed to notice 
them. 

The Very Young Man was calculating the time. 
“Probably they are just getting to Orlog with Loto,” he 
said. “Once we get out of Arite we’ll travel fast; we’ll 
have him back in two or three hours.” 

Aura said nothing, but walked beside him. Once or 
twice she looked back over her shoulder. 

They were in the outskirts of the city, when suddenly 
the girl gripped her companion by the arm. 

“Some one—behind us,” she whispered. The Very 
Young Man resisted an impulse to look around. They 


Aura 


233 


had come to a cross street; the Very Young Man abruptly 
turned the corner, and clutching Aura by the hand ran 
swiftly forward a short distance. When they had slowed 
down to a walk again the Very Young Man looked 
cautiously back over his shoulder. As he did so he caught 
a glimpse of three men who had just reached the corner, 
and who darted hastily back out of sight as he turned his 
head. 


CHAPTER XXVIII 


THE ATTACK ON THE PALACE 

O TEO led the two men swiftly through the city to¬ 
wards Reoh’s house. There were few pedestrians 
about and no one seemed particularly to notice them. 
Yet somehow, the Big Business Man thought, there hung 
about the city an ominous air of unrest. Perhaps it was 
the abnormal quiet—that solemn sinister look of deserted 
streets; or perhaps it was an occasional face peering at 
them from a window, or a figure lurking in a doorway 
disappearing at their approach. The Big Business Man 
found his heart beating fast. Pie suddenly felt very 
much alone. The realization came to him that he was in 
a strange world, surrounded by beings of another race, 
most of whom, he knew now, hated and feared him and 
those who had come with him. 

Then his thoughts took another turn. He looked up at 
the brilliant galaxy of stars overhead. New, unexplored 
worlds! Thousands, millions of them! In one tiny, 
little atom of a woman’s wedding-ring! Then he thought 
of his friend the Banker. Perhaps the ring had not been 
moved from its place in the clubroom. Then—he looked 
at the sky again—then Broadway—only thirty feet away 
from him this moment! He smiled a little at this concep¬ 
tion, and drew a long breath—awed by his thoughts. 

Oteo was plucking at his sleeve and pointing. Across 
the street stood Reoh’s house. The Doctor knocked upon 
its partially open front door, and, receiving no answer, 
they entered silently, with the dread sense of impending 

234 




The Attack on the Palace 235 

evil hanging over them. The Doctor led the way into the 
old man’s study. At the threshold he stopped, shocked 
into immobility. Upon the floor, with the knife still in it, 
lay Reoh’s body. The Doctor made a hasty examination, 
although the presence of the knife obviously made it un¬ 
necessary. 

A hurried search of the house convinced them that Aura 
and the Very Young Man were not there. The two men, 
confused by this double disaster, were at a loss to know 
what to do. 

“They’ve got him,’’ said the Big Business Man with 
conviction. “And the girl too, probably. He must have 
come back just as they were killing Reoh.” 

“There wasn’t much time,” the Doctor said. “He was 
back here in ten minutes. But they’ve got him—you’re 
right—or he would have been back with us before this.” 

“They’ll take him and the girl to Orlog. They won’t 

hurt them because they-” The Big Business Man 

stopped abruptly; his face went white. “Good God, 
Frank, do you realize? They’ve got the drugs now!” 

Targo had the drugs! The Big Business Man shud¬ 
dered with fear at the thought. Their situation would be 
desperate, indeed, if that were so. 

The Doctor reasoned it out more calmly. “I hadn’t 
thought of that,” he said slowly. “And it makes me 
think perhaps they have not captured Jack. If they had 
the drugs they would lose no time in using them. They 
haven’t used them yet—that’s evident.” 

The Big Business Man was about to reply when there 
came a shouting from the street outside, and the sound of 
many feet rushing past the house. They hurried to the 
door. A mob swept by—a mob of nearly a thousand 
persons. Most of them were men. Some were armed 
with swords; others brandished huge stones or lengths of 
beaten gold implements, perhaps with which they had 



236 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

been working, and which now they held as weapons. 

The mob ran swiftly, with vainglorious shouts from its 
leaders. It turned a corner near-by and disappeared. 

From every house now people appeared, and soon the 
streets were full of scurrying pedestrians. Most of them 
followed the direction taken by the mob. The listeners 
in the doorway could hear now, from far away, the sound 
of shouts and cheering. And from all around them came 
the buzz and hum of busy streets. The city was 
thoroughly awake—alert and expectant. 

The Big Business Man flung the door wide. “I’m go¬ 
ing to follow that crowd. See what’s going on. We 
can't stay here in the midst of this.” 

The Doctor and Oteo followed him out into the street, 
and they mingled with the hastening crowd. In their ex¬ 
citement they walked freely among the people. No one 
appeared to notice them, for the crowd was as excited as 
they, hurrying along, heedless of its immediate surround¬ 
ings. As they advanced, the street became more con¬ 
gested. 

Down another street they saw fighting going on—a 
weaponless crowd swaying and struggling aimlessly. A 
number of armed men charged this crowd—men who by 
their breast-plates and swords the Big Business Man rec¬ 
ognized as the police. The crowd ceased struggling and 
dispersed, only to gather again in another place. 

The city was in a turmoil of excitement without appar¬ 
ent reason, or definite object. Yet there was a steady 
tide in the direction the first armed mob had gone, and 
with that tide went the Big Business Man and his two 
companions. 

After a time they came to an open park, beyond which, 
on a prominence, with the lake behind, stood a large build¬ 
ing that the Chemist had already pointed out to them as 
the king’s palace. 


The Attack on the Palace 237 

Oteo led them swiftly into a side street to avoid the 
dense crowd around the park. Making a slight detour 
they came back to it again—much nearer the palace now— 
and approached from behind a house that fronted the open 
space near the palace. 

“Friend of the Master—his house!” Oteo explained as 
he knocked peremptorily at a side door. 

They waited a moment, but no one came. Oteo pushed 
the door and led them within. The house was deserted, 
and following Oteo, they went to the roof. Here they 
could see perfectly what was going on around the palace, 
and in the park below them. 

This park was nearly triangular in shape—a thousand 
feet possibly on each side. At the base of the triangle, on 
a bluff with the lake behind it, stood the palace. Its main 
entrance, two huge golden doors, stood at the top of a 
broad flight of stone steps. On these steps a fight was in 
progress. A mob surged up them, repulsed at the top by 
a score or more of men armed with swords, who were de¬ 
fending the doorway. 

The square was thronged with people watching the 
palace steps and shouting almost continuously. The fight 
before the palace evidently had been in progress for some 
time. Many dead were lying in the doorway and on the 
steps below it. The few defenders had so far resisted 
successfully against tremendous odds, for the invaders, 
pressed upward by those behind, could not retreat, and 
were being killed at the top from lack of space in which 
to fight. 

“Look there,” cried the Big Business Man suddenly. 
Coming down a cross street, marching in orderly array 
with its commander in front, was a company of soldier 
police. It came to a halt almost directly beneath the 
watchers on the roof-tops, and its leader brandishing his 
sword after a moment of hesitation, ordered his men to 


238 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

charge the crowd. They did not move at the order, but 
stood sullenly in'their places. Again he ordered them 
forward, and, as they refused to obey, made a threatening 
move towards them. 

In sudden frenzy, those nearest leaped upon him, and 
in an instant he lay dead upon the ground, with half a 
dozen swords run through his body. Then the men 
stood, in formation still, apathetically watching the events 
that were going on around them. 

Meanwhile the fight on the palace steps raged more 
furiously than ever. The defenders were reduced now 
to a mere handful. 

“A moment more—they’ll be in,” said the Doctor 
breathlessly. Hardly had he spoken when, with a sudden, 
irresistible rush, the last of the guards were swept away, 
and the invaders surged through the doorway into the 
palace?. 

A great cry went up from the crowd in the park as the 
palace was taken—a cry of applause mingled with awe, 
for they were a little frightened at what they were seeing. 

Perhaps a hundred people crowded through the door¬ 
way into the palace; the others stood outside—on the steps 
and on the terrace below—waiting. Hardly more than 
five minutes went by when a man appeared on the palace 
roof. He advanced to the parapet with several others 
standing respectfully behind him. 

“Targo!” murmered Oteo. 

It was Targo—Targo triumphantly standing with up¬ 
lifted arms before the people he was to rule. When the 
din that was raised at his appearance had subsided a little 
he spoke; one short sentence, and then he paused. There 
was a moment of indecision in the crowd before it broke 
into tumultuous cheers. 

“The king—he killed,” Oteo said softly, looking at his 
master’s friends with big, frightened eyes. 


The Attcuck on the Palace 239 

The Big Business Man stared out over the waving, 
cheering throng, with the huge, dominant, triumphant 
figure of Targo above and muttered to himself, “The king 
is dead; long live the king.” 

When he could make himself heard, Targo spoke again. 
The Doctor and the Big Business Man were leaning over 
the parapet watching the scene, when suddenly a stone 
flew up from the crowd beneath, and struck the railing 
within a few feet of where they were standing. They 
glanced down in surprise, and realized, from the faces 
that were upturned, that they were recognized. A mur¬ 
mur ran over the crowd directly below, and then some¬ 
one raised a shout. Four words it seemed to be, repeated 
over and over. Gradually the shout spread—“Death 
to the Giants,” the Big Business Man knew it was— 
“Death to the Giants,” until the whole mass of people 
were calling it rhythmically—drowning out Targo’s voice 
completely. A thousand faces now stared up at the men 
on the roof-top and a rain of stones began falling around 
them. 

The Doctor clutched his friend by the arm and pulled 
him back from the parapet. “They know us—good God, 
don’t you see?” he said tensely. “Come on. We must 
get out of this. There’ll be trouble.” He started across 
the roof towards the opening that led down into the house. 

The Big Business Man jerked himself free from the 
grasp that held him. 

“I do see,” he cried a little wildly. “I do see we’ve 
been damn fools. There’ll be trouble. You’re right— 
there will be trouble; but it won’t be ours. I’m through— 
through with this miserable little atom and its swarm of 
insects.” He gripped the Doctor by both shoulders. 
“My God, Frank, can’t you understand ? We’re men, you 
and I—men! These creatures”—he waved his arm back 
towards the city—“nothing but insects—infinitesimal— 


240 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

smaller than the smallest thing vve ever dreamed of. And 
we take them seriously. Don’t you understand? Seri¬ 
ously! God, man, that’s funny, not tragic.” 

He fumbled at the neck of his robe, and tearing it 
away, brought out a vial of the drugs. 

“Here,” he exclaimed, and offered one of the pellets. 

“Not too much,” warned the Doctor vehemently, “only 
touch it to your tongue.” 

Oteo, with pleading eyes, watched them taking the 
drug, and the Doctor handed him a pellet, showing him 
how to take it. 

As they stood together upon the roof-top, clinging to 
one another, the city dwindled away rapidly beneath them. 
By the time the drug had ceased to act there was hardly 
room for them to stand on the roof, and the house, had 
it not been built solidly of stone, would have been crushed 
under their weight. At first they felt a little dizzy, as 
though they were hanging in mid-air, or were in a balloon, 
looking down at the city. Then gradually, they seemed 
to be of normal size again, balancing themselves awkardly 
upon a little toy-house whose top was hardly bigger than 
their feet. 

The park, only a step now beneath the house-top, 
swarmed with tiny figures less than two inches in height. 
Targo still stood upon the palace roof; they could have 
reached down and picked him up between thumb and 
forefinger. The whole city lay within a radius of a few 
hundred feet around them. 

When they had stopped increasing in size, they leaped 
in turn over the palace, landing upon the broad beach of 
the lake. Then they began walking along it. There was 
only room for one on the sand, and the other two, for 
they walked abreast, waded ankle-deep in the water. 
From the little city below them they cbuld hear the hum 
of a myriad of tiny voices—thin, shrill and faint. Sud- 


The Attack on the Palace 


241 


denly the Big Business Man laughed. There was no 
hysteria in his voice now—just amusement and relief. 

“And we took that seriously,” he said. “Funny, isn’t 
it?” 


CHAPTER XXIX 


ON THE LAKE 

4 *^L/'OU , RE right—we are being followed,” the 
X Very Young Man said soberly. He had pulled 
the girl over close against the wall of a house. “Did you 
see that?” 

“Three, they are,” Aura answered. “I saw them be¬ 
fore—in the street below—Targo’s men.” 

Evidently the three men had been watching the house 
from which they had come and had followed them from 
there. If they were Targo’s men, as seemed very prob¬ 
able, the Very Young Man could not understand why they 
had not already attacked him. Perhaps they intended 
to as soon as he and Aura had reached a more secluded 
part of the city. They must know he had the drugs, and 
to gain possession of those certainly was what they were 
striving for. The Very Young Man realized he must 
take no chances; to lose the drugs would be fatal to them 
all. 

“Are we near the edge of the city?” he asked. 

“Yes, very near.” 

“Then we shall get large here. If we make a run for it 
we will be in the country before we are big enough to at- 
track too much attention. Understand, Aura?” 

“I understand.” 

“We mustn’t stir up the city if we can help it; with 
giants running around, the people would get worked up to 
a frenzy. You could see that with Lylda this afternoon. 

Not that you can blame them altogether, but we want to 

242 



On the Lake 


243 


get Loto back before we start anything here in Ante.” 
He took the pellets out as he spoke, and they each touched 
one of them to the tip of their tongues. 

“Now, then, come on—not too fast, we want to keep 
going,” said the Very Young Man, taking the girl by the 
hand again. 

As they started off, running slowly down the street, the 
Very Young Man looked back. The three men were 
running after them—not fast, seeming content merely to 
keep their distance. The Very Young Man laughed. 
“Wait till they see us get big. Fine chance they’ve got.” 

Aura, her lithe, young body in perfect condition, ran 
lightly and easily as a fawn. She made a pretty picture 
as she ran, with her long, black hair streaming out behind 
her, and the short silk tunic flapping about her lean, 
round thighs. She still held the Very Young Man by the 
hand, running just in advance of him, guiding him 
through the streets, which in this part of the city were 
more broken up and irregular. 

They had not gone more than a hundred yards when 
the pavement began to move unsteadily under them, as the 
deck of a plunging ship feels to one who runs its length, 
and the houses they were swiftly passing began visibly to 
decrease in size. The Very Young Man felt the girl 
falter in her stride. He dropped her hand and slipped his 
arm about her waist, holding her other hand against it. 
She smiled up into his eyes, and thus they ran on, side by 
side. 

A few moments more and they were in the open 
country, running on a road that wound through the hills, 
between cultivated fields dotted here and there with 
houses. The landscape dwindled beneath them steadily, 
until they seemed to be running along a narrow, curving 
path, bordered by little patches of different-colored 
ground, like a checkerboard. The houses they passed 


244 


The Girl in the Golden Atom 

now hardly reached as high as their knees. Sometimes 
peasants stood in the doorways of these houses watching 
them in terror. Occasionally they passed a farmer 
ploughing his field, who stopped his work, stricken dumb, 
and stared at them as they went swiftly by. 

When they were well out into the country, perhaps a 
quarter of the way to Orlog—for to beings so huge as 
they the distance was not great—the Very Young Man 
slowed down to a walk. 

“How far have we gone?’’ he asked. 

Aura stopped abruptly and looked around her. They 
seemed now to be at the bottom of a huge, circular, shal¬ 
low bowl. In every direction from where they stood the 
land curved upward towards the rim of the bowl that was 
the horizon—a line, not sharp and well defined, but dim 
and hazy, melting away into the blackness of the star- 
studded sky. Behind them, hardly more than a mile 
away, according to their present stature—they had 
stopped growing entirely now—lay the city of Arite. 
They could see completely across it and out into the 
country beyond. 

The lake, with whose shore they had been running 
parallel, was much closer to them. Ahead, up near the 
rim of the horizon, lay a black smudge. Aura pointed. 
“Orlog is there,” she said. “You see it?” 

To the Very Young Man suddenly came the realization 
that already he was facing the problem of how to get into 
Orlog unheralded. If they remained in their present 
size they could easily walk there in an hour or less. But 
long before that they would be seen and recognized. 

The Very Young Man feared for Loto’s safety if he 
allowed that to happen. He seemed to be able to make 
out the city of Orlog now. It was smaller than Arite, 
and lay partially behind a hill, with most of its houses 
strung along the lake shore. If only they were not so 



On the Lake 


245 

tall they could not be seen so readily. But if they became 
smaller it would take them much longer to get there. 
And eventually they would have to become normal Oroid 
size, or even smaller, in order to get into the city un¬ 
noticed.. The Very Young Man thought of the lake. 
Perhaps that would be th,e best way. 

“Can you swim?” he asked. And Aura, with her 
readv smile, answered that she could. “If we are in the 
water,” she added, seeming to have followed his thoughts, 
“they would not see us. I can swim very far—can you ?” 

The Very Young Man nodded. 

“If we could get near to Orlog in the water,” he said, 
“we might get a boat. And then when we were small, we 
could sail up. They wouldn’t see us then.” 

“There are many boats,” answered the girl in agree¬ 
ment. “Look!” 

There were, indeed, on the lake, within sight of them 
now, several boats. “We must get the one nearest 
Orlog,” the Very Young Man said. “Or else it will beat 
us in and carry the news.” 

In a few minutes more they were at the lake shore. 
The Very Young Man wore, underneath his robe, a close- 
fitting knitted garment very much like a bathing-suit. 
He took off his robe now, and rolling it up, tied it across 
his back with the cord he had worn around his waist. 
Aura’s tunic was too short to impede her swimming and 
when the Very Young Man was ready, they waded out 
into the water together. They found the lake no deeper 
than to Aura’s shoulders, but as it was easier to swim 
than t'o wade, they began swimming—away from shore 
towards the farthest boat that evidently was headed for 
Orlog. 

The Very Young Man thought with satisfaction that, 
with only their heads visible, huge as they would appear, 
they could probably reach this boat without being seen by 


246 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

any one in Orlog. The boat was perhaps a quarter of a 
mile from them—a tiny little toy vessel, it seemed, that 
they never would have seen except for its sail. 

They came up to it rapidly, for they were swimming 
very much faster than it could sail, passing close to one 
of the others and nearly swamping it by the waves they 
made. As they neared the boat they were pursuing it 
was different from any the Very Young Man had seen so 
far, a single, canoe-shaped hull, with out-riders on both 
sides—they could see it held but a single occupant, a man 
who sat in its stern—a figure about as long as one of the 
Very Young Man’s fingers. 

The Very Young Man and Aura were swimming side 
by side, now. The water was perfect in temperature— 
neither too hot nor too cold; they had not been swim¬ 
ming fast, and were not winded. 

“We’ve got him, what’ll we do with him,” the Very 
Young Man wanted to know in dismay, as the thought 
occurred to him, He might have been more puzzled at 
how to take the drug to make them smaller while they 
were swimming, but Aura’s answer solved both problems. 

“There is an island,” she said flinging an arm up out of 
the water. “We can push the boat to it, and him we can 
leave there. Is that not the thing to do?” 

“You bet your life,” the Very Young Man agreed, en¬ 
thusiastically. “That’s just the thing to do.” 

# As they came within reach of the boat the Very Young 
Man stopped swimming and found that the water was 
not much deeper than his waist. The man in the boat ap¬ 
peared now about to throw himself into the lake from 
fright. 

“Tell him, Aura,” the Very Young Man said. “We 
won’t hurt him.” 

Wading through the water, they pushed the boat with 
its terrified occupant carefully in front of them towards 


/ 


On the Lake 


247 


the island, which was not more than two or three hundred 
yards away. The Very Young Man found this rather 
slow work; becoming impatient, he seized the boat in his 
hand, pinning the man against its seat with his fore¬ 
finger so he would not fall out. Then raising the boat 
out of the water over his head he waded forward much 
more rapidly. 

The island, which they reached in a few moments more, 
was circular in shape, and about fifty feet in diameter. It 
had a beach entirely around it; a hill perhaps ten feet high 
rose near its center, and at one end it was heavily wooded. 
There were no houses to be seen. 

The Very Young Man set the boat back on the water, 
and they pushed it up on the beach. When it grounded 
the tiny man leaped out and ran swiftly along the sand. 
The Very Young Man and Aura laughed heartily as they 
stood ankle-deep in the water beside the boat, watching 
him. For nearly five minutes he ran; then suddenly he 
ducked inland and disappeared in the woods. 

When they were left alone they lost no time in becom¬ 
ing normal Oroid size. The boat now appeared about 
twenty-five feet long—a narrow, canoe-shaped hull hol¬ 
lowed out of a tree-trunk. They climbed into it, and 
with a long pole they found lying in its bottom, the Very 
Young Man shoved it off the beach. 


CHAPTER XXX 


WORD MUSIC 

T HE boat had a mast stepped near the bow, and a 
triangular cloth sail. The Very Young Man sat 
in the stern, steering with a short, broad-bladed paddle; 
Aura lay on a pile of rushes in the bottom of the boat, 
looking up at him. 

For about half a mile the Very Young Man sailed along 
parallel with the beach, looking for the man they had 
marooned. He was nowhere in sight, and they finally 
headed out into the lake tdwards Orlog, which they could 
just see dimly on the further shore. 

The breeze was fresh, and they made good time. The 
boat steered easily, and the Very,Young Man, reclining on 
one elbow, with Aura at his feet, felt at peace with him¬ 
self and with the world. Again he thought this girl the 
prettiest he had ever seen. There was something, too, of 
a spiritual quality in the delicate smallness of her features 
—a sweetness of expression in her quick, understanding 
smile, and an honest clearness in her steady gaze that 
somehow he seemed never to have seen in a girl’s face be¬ 
fore. 

He felt again, now that he had time to think more of 
her, that same old diffidence that had come to him before 
when they were alone in the store-room of her home. 
That she did not share this feeling was obvious from the 
frankness and ease of her manner. 

For some time after leaving the island neither spoke. 

The Very Young Man felt the girl’s eyes fixed almost 

248 


Word Music 


249 


constantly upon him—a calm gaze that held in it a great 
curiosity and wonderment. He steered steadily onward 
towards Orlog. There was, for the moment, nothing to 
discuss concerning their adventure, and he wondered what 
he should say to this girl who stared at him so frankly. 
Then he met her eyes, and again she smiled with that 
perfect sense of comradeship he had so seldom felt with 
women of his own race. 

“You're very beautiful,” said the Very Young Man 
abruptly. 

The girl’s eyes widened a little, but she did not drop her 
lashes. “I want to be beautiful; if you think it is so, I 
am very glad.” 

“I do. I think you’re the prettiest girl I ever saw.” 
He blurted out the words impetuously. He was very 
earnest, very sincere, and very young. 

A trace of coquetry came into the girl’s manner. 
“Prettier than the girls of your world? Are they not 
pretty?” 

“Oh, yes—of course; but-” 

“What?” she asked when he paused. 

The Very Young Man considered a moment. “You’re 
—you’re different,” he said finally. She waited. “You 
—you don’t know how to flirt, for one thing.” 

The girl turned her head away and looked at him a 
little sidewise through lowered lashes. 

“How do you know that ?” she asked demurely; and the 
Very Young Man admitted to himself with a shock of 
surprise that he certainly was totally wrong in that deduc¬ 
tion at least. 

“Tell me of the girls in your world,” she went on after 
a moment’s silence. “My sister’s husband many times he 
has told me of the wonderful things up there in that great 
land. But more I would like to hear.” 

He told her, with an eloquence and enthusiasm born of 



*5° 


The Girl in the Golden Atom 


outh, about his own life and those of his people. She 
juestioned eagerly and with an intelligence that surprised 
him, for she knew far more of the subject than he 
realized. 

“These girls of your country,” she interrupted him 
once. “They, too, are very beautiful; they wear fine 
clothes—I know—my brother he has told me.” 

“Yes,” said the Very Youngf Man. 

“And are they very learned—very .clever—do they work 
and govern, like the men?” 

“Some are very learned. And they are beginning to 
govern, like the men; but not so much as you do here.” 

The girl’s forehead wrinkled. “My brother he once 
told me,” she said slowly, “that in your world many 
women are bad. Is that so ?” 

“Some are, of course. And some men think that most 
are. But I don’t; I think women are splendid.” 

‘‘If that is so, then better I can understand what I have 
heard,” the girl answered thoughtfully. “If Oroid 
women were as I have heard my brother talk of some of 
yours, this world of ours would soon be full of evil.” 

“You are different,” the Very Young Man said quickly. 
“You—and Lylda.” 

“The women here, they have kept the evil out of life,” 
the girl went on. “It is their duty—their responsibility 
to their race. Your good women—they have not always 
governed as we have. Why is that?” 

“I do not know,” the Very Young Man admitted. 
“Except because the men would not let them.” 

“Why not, if they are just as learned as the men?” 
The girl was smiling—a little roguish, twisted smile. 

“There are very clever girls,” the Very Young Man 
went on hastily; he found himself a little on the defensive, 
and he did not know just why. “They are able to do 
things in the world. But—many men do not like them.” 



Word Music 


251 


Aura was smiling openly now, and her eyes twinkled 
with mischief. ‘‘Perhaps it is the men are jealous. 
Could that not be so?” 

The Very Young Man did not answer, and the girl 
went on more seriously. “The women of my race, they 
are very just. Perhaps you know that, Jack. Often has 
my brother told us of his own great world and of its 
problems. And the many things he has told us—Lylda 
and I—we have often wondered. For every question has 
its other side, and we cannot judge—from him alone.” 

The Very Young Man, surprised at the turn their con¬ 
versation had taken, and confused a little by this calm logic 
from a girl—particularly from so young and pretty a 
girl—was at a loss how to go on. 

“You cannot understand. Aura,” he finally said 
seriously. “Women may be all kinds; some are bad— 
some are good. Down here I know it is not that way. 
Sometimes when a girl is smart she thinks she is smarter 
than any living man. You would not like that sort of 
girl would you?” 

“My brother never said it just that way,” she an¬ 
swered with equal seriousness. “No, that would be bad 
—very bad. In our land women are only different from 
men. They know they are not better or worse—only dif¬ 
ferent.” 

The Very Young Man was thinking of a girl he once 
knew. “I hate clever girls,” he blurted out. 

Aura’s eyes were teasing him again. “I am so sorry,” 
she said sadly. 

The Very Young Man looked his surprise. “Why are 
you sorry?” 

“My sister, she once told me I was clever. My brother 
said it, too, and I believed them.” 

The Very Young Man flushed. 

“You’re different,” he repeated. 



252 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

“How—different?” She was looking at him sidewise 
again. 

“I don’t know; I’ve been trying to think—but you are. 
And I don’t hate you—I like you—very, very much.” 

“I like you, too,” she answered frankly, and the Very 
Young Man thought of Loto as she said it. He was 
leaning down towards her, and their hands met for an, 
instant. 

The Very Young Man had spread his robe out to dry 
when he first got into the boat, and now he put it on while 
Aura steered. Then he sat beside her on the seat, taking 
the paddle again. 

“Do you go often to the theater?” she asked after a 
time. 

“Oh, yes, often.” 

“Nothing like that do we have here,” she added, a little 
wistfully. “Only once, when we played a game in the 
field beyond my brother’s home. Lylda was the queen 
and I her lady. And do you go to the opera, too ? My 
brother he has told me of the opera. How wonderful 
must that be! So beautiful—more beautiful even it must 
be than Lylda’s music. But never shall it be for me.” 
She smiled sadly: “Never shall I be able to hear it.” 

An eager contradiction sprang to the Very Young 
Man’s lips, but the girl shook her head quietly. 

For several minutes they did not speak. The wind be¬ 
hind them blew the girl’s long hair forward over her 
shoulders. A lock of it fell upon the Very Young Man’s 
hand as it lay on the seat between them, and unseen he 
twisted it about his fingers. The wind against his neck 
felt warm and pleasant; the murmur of the water flowing 
past sounded low and sweet and soothing. Overhead the 
stars hung very big and bright. It was like sailing on a 
perfect night in his own world. He was very conscious 
of the girl’s nearness now—conscious of the clinging 


Word Music 


2 53 

softness of her hair about his fingers. And all at once he 
found himself softly quoting some half-forgotten lines: 

“If I were king, ah, love! If I were king 
What tributary nations I would bring 
To bow before your scepter and to swear 
Allegiance to your lips and eyes and hair.” 

Aura's questioning glance of surprise brought him to 
himself. ‘‘That is so pretty—what is that?” she asked 
eagerly. ‘‘Never have I heard one speak like that be¬ 
fore.” 

‘‘Why, that’s poetry; haven’t you ever heard any 
poetry ?” 

The girl shook her head. “It’s just like music—it 
sings. Do it again.” 

The Very Young Man suddenly felt very self- 
conscious. 

“Do it again—please.” She looked pleadingly up into 

his face and the Very Young Man went on: 

“Beneath your feet what treasures I would fling! 

The stars would be your pearls upon a string; 

The world a ruby for your finger-ring; 

And you could have the sun and moon to wear 
If I were king.” 

The girl clapped her hands artlessly. “Oh, that is so 
pretty. Never did I know that words could sound like 
that. Say it some more, please.” 

And the Very Young Man, sitting under the stars be¬ 
side this beautiful little creature of another world, 
searched into his memory and for her who never before 
had known that w'ords could rhyme, opened up the realm 
of poetry. 



CHAPTER XXXI 


THE PALACE OF ORLOG 

E NGROSSED with each other the Very Young Man 
and Aura sailed close up to the water-front of Orlog 
before they remembered their situation. It was the Very 
Young Man who first became aware of the danger. 
Without explanation he suddenly pulled Aura into the 
bottom of the boat, leaving it to flutter up into the wind 
unguided. 

“They might see us from here/’ he said hurriedly. 
“We must decide what is best for us to do now.” 

They were then less than a quarter of a mile from the 
stone quay that marked the city’s principal landing-place. 
Nearer to them was a broad, sandy beach behind which, in 
a long string along the lake shore, lay the city. Its 
houses were not unlike those of Arite, although most of 
them were rather smaller and less pretentious. On a rise 
of ground just beyond the beach, and nearly in front of 
them, stood an elaborate building that was Targo’s palace. 

“We daren’t go much closer,” the Very Young Man 
said. “They’d recognize us.” 

“You they would know for one of the strangers,” said 
Aura. “But if I should steer and you were hidden no one 
would notice.” 

The Very Young Man realized a difficulty. “We’ve 
got to be very small when we go into the city.” 

“How small would you think?” asked Aura. 

The Very Young Man held his hands about a foot 
apart. “You see, the trouble is, we must be small enough 

254 


The Palace of Or log 255 

to get around without too much danger of being seen; 
but if we get too small it would be a terrible walk up 
there to Targo’s palace.” 

“We cannot sail this boat if we are such a size,” Aura 
declared. “Too large it would be for us to steer.” 

“That’s just it, but we can’t go any closer this way.” 

Aura thought a moment. “If you lie there,” she indi¬ 
cated the bottom of the boat under a forward seat, “no 
one can see. And I will steer—there to the beach ahead; 
me they will not notice. Then at the beach we will take 
the drug.” 

“We’ve got to take a chance,” said the Very Young 
Man. “Some one may come along and see us getting 
small.” 

They talked it over very carefully for some time. 
Finally they decided to follow Aura’s plan and run the 
boat to the beach under her guidance; then to take the 
drug. There were few people around the lake front at 
this hour; the beach itself, as far as they could see, was 
entirely deserted, and the danger of discovery seemed 
slight. Aura pointed out, however, that once on shore, 
if their stature were so great as a foot they would be 
even more conspicuous than when of normal size even 
allowing for the strangeness of the Very Young Man’s ap¬ 
pearance. The Very Young Man made a calculation and 
reached the conclusion that with a height of six or seven 
inches they would have to walk about a mile from the 
landing-place to reach Targo’s palace. They decided to 
become as near that size as they conveniently could. 

When both fully understood what they intended to do, 
the Very Young Man gave Aura one of the pellets of the 
drug and lay down in the bow of the boat. Without a 
word the girl took her seat in the stern and steered for 
the beach. When they were close inshore Aura signalled 
her companion and at the same moment both took the 


256 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

drug. Then she left her seat and lay down beside the 
Very Young Man. The boat, from the momentum it had 
gained, floated inshore and grounded gently on the beach. 

As they lay there, the Very Young Man could see the 
sides of the boat growing up steadily above their heads. 
The gunwale was nearly six feet above them before he 
realized a new danger. Scrambling to his feet he pulled 
the girl up with him; even when standing upright their 
heads came below the sides of the vessel. 

“We’ve got to get out right now,” the Very Young 
Man said in an excited whisper. “We’d be too small.” 
He led the girl hastily into the bow and with a running 
leap clambered up and sat astride the gunwale. Then, 
reaching down he pulled Aura up beside him. 

In a moment they had dropped overboard up to their 
shoulders in the water. High overhead loomed the hull 
of the boat—a large sailing vessel it seemed to them now. 
They started wading towards shore immediately, but, be¬ 
cause they were so rapidly diminishing in size, it was 
nearly five minutes before they could get there. 

Once on shore they lay prone upon the sand, waiting 
for the drug to cease its action. When, by proper ad¬ 
ministering of both chemicals, they had reached ap¬ 
proximately their predetermined stature, which, in itself, 
required considerable calculation on the Very Young 
Man’s part, they stood up near the water’s edge and 
looked about them. 

The beach to them now, with its coarse-grained sand, 
seemed nearly a quarter of a mile wide; in length it ex¬ 
tended as far as they could see in both directions. Be¬ 
yond the beach, directly in front of them on a hill per¬ 
haps a thousand feet above the lake level, and about a 
mile or more away, stood Targo’s palace. To the Very 
Young Man it looked far larger than any building he 
had ever seen. 


The Palace of Or log 257 

The boat in which they had landed lay on the water 
with its bow on the beach beside them. It was now a 
vessel some two hundred and fifty feet in length, with 
sides twenty feet high and a mast towering over a hun¬ 
dred feet in the air. 

There was no one in sight from where they stood. 
“Come on, Aura/’ said the Very Young Man, and started 
off across the beach towards the hill. 

It was a long walk through the heavy sand to the foot 
of the hill. When they arrived they found themselves at 
the beginning of a broad stone roadway—only a path to 
those of normal Oroid size—that wound back and forth 
up the hill to the palace. They walked up this road, and 
as they progressed, saw that it was laid through a grassy 
lawn that covered the entire hillside—a lawn with gray- 
blue blades of grass half as high as their todies. 

After walking about ten minutes they came to a short 
flight of steps. Each step was twice as high as their 
heads—impossible of ascent—so they made a detour 
through the grass. 

Suddenly Aura clutched the Very Young Man by the 
arm with a whispered exclamation, and they both dropped 
to the ground. A man was coming down the roadway; 
he was just above the steps when they first saw him—a 
man so tall that, standing beside him, they would have 
reached hardy above his ankles. The long grass in which 
they were lying hid them effectually from his sight and 
he passed them by unnoticed. When he was gone the 
Very Young Man drew a long breath. “We must watch 
that,” he said apprehensively. “If any one sees us now 
it’s all off. We must be extremely careful.” 

It took the two adventurers over an hour to get safely 
up the hill and into the palace. Its main entrance, ap¬ 
proached by a long flight of steps, was an impossible 
means of ingress, but Aura fortunately knew of a smaller 


258 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

door at the side which led into the basement of the build¬ 
ing. This door they found slightly ajar. It was open so 
little, however, that they could not get past, and as they 
were not strong enough even with their combined efforts, 
to swing the door open, they were again brought to a 
halt. 

“We’d better get still smaller,” the Very Young Man 
whispered somewhat nervously. “There’s less danger 
that way.’’ 

They reduced their size, perhaps one half, and when 
that was accomplished the crack in the door had widened 
sufficiently to let them in. Within the building they 
found themselves in a hallway several hundred feet wide 
and half a mile or more in length—its ceiling high as the 
roof of some great auditorium. The Very Young Man 
looked about in dismay. “Great Scott,” he ejaculated, 
“this won’t do at all.” 

“Many times I have been here,” said Aura. “It looks 
so very different now, but I think I know the way.” 

“That may be,” agreed the Very Young Man dubiously, 
“but we’d have to walk miles if we stay as small as this.” 

A heavy tread sounded far away in the distance. The 
Very Young Man and Aura shrank back against the 
wall, close by the door. In a moment a man’s feet and 
the lower part of his legs came into view. He stopped 
by the door, pulling it inward. The Very Young Man 
looked up into the air ; a hundred and fifty feet, perhaps, 
above their heads he saw the man’s face looking out 
through the doorway. 

In a moment another man joined him, coming from 
outside, and they spoke together for a time. Their roar¬ 
ing voices, coming down from this great height, were 
nevertheless distinctly audible. 

“In the audience room,” Aura whispered, after listen¬ 
ing an instant, “Targo’s younger brother talks with his 


The Palace of Orlog 259 

counsellors. Big things they are planning.” The Very 
Young Man did not answer; the two men continued their 
brief conversation and parted. 

When the Very Young Man and Aura were left alone, 
he turned to the girl eagerly. “Did they mention Loto? 
Is he here ?” 

“Of him they did not speak,” Aura answered. “It is 
best that we go to the audience room, where they are talk¬ 
ing. Then, perhaps, we will know.” The Very Young 
Man agreed, and they started off. 

For nearly half an hour they trudged onward along this 
seemingless endless hallway. Then again they were con¬ 
fronted with a flight of steps—this time steps that were 
each more than three times their own height. 

“We’ve got to chance it,” said the Very Young Man, 
and after listening carefully and hearing no one about, 
they again took the drug, making themselves sufficiently 
large to ascend these steps to the upper story of the 
building. 

It was nearly an hour before the two intruders, after 
several narrow escapes from discovery, and by alternating 
doses of both drugs, succeeded in getting into the room 
where Targo’s brother and his advisers were in con¬ 
ference. 

They entered through the open door—a doorway so 
wide that a hundred like them could have marched through 
it abreast. A thousand feet away across the vastness of 
the room they could see Targo’s brother and ten of his 
men—sitting on mats upon the floor, talking earnestly. 
Before them stood a stone bench on which were a number 
of golden goblets and plates of food. 

The adventurers ran swiftly down the length of the 
room, following its wall. It echoed with their footfalls, 
but they knew that this sound, so loud to their ears, would 
be inaudible to the huge figures they were approaching. 


260 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

“They won’t see us,” whispered the Very Young Man, 
“let’s get up close.” And in a few moments more they 
were standing beside one of the figures, sheltered from 
sight by a corner of the mat upon which the man was 
sitting. His foot, bent sidewise under him upon the 
floor, was almost within reach of the Very Young Man s 
hand. The fibre thong that fastened its sandal looked like 
a huge rope thick as the Very Young Man’s ankle, and 
each of its toes were half as long as his entire body. 

Targo’s brother, a younger man than those with him, 
appeared to be doing most of the talking. He it was be¬ 
side whom Aura and the Very Young Man were standing. 

“You tell me if they mention Loto,” whispered the 
Very Young Man. Aura nodded and they stood silent, 
listening. The men all appeared deeply engrossed with 
what their leader was saying. The Very Young Man, 
watching his companion’s face, saw an expression of con¬ 
cern and fear upon it. She leaned towards him. 

“In Arite, to-night,” she whispered, “Targo is or¬ 
ganizing men to attack the palace of the king. Him will 
they kill—then Targo will be proclaimed leader of all the 
Oroid nation.” 

“We must get back,” the Very Young Man answered in 
an anxious whisper. “I wish we knew where Loto was; 
haven’t they mentioned him—or any of us?” 

Aura did not reply, and the Very Young Man waited 
silent. Once one of the men laughed—a laugh that 
drifted out into the immense distances of the room in 
great waves of sound. Aura gripped her companion by 
the arm. 

“Then when Targo rules the land, they will send a 
messenger to my brother. Him they will tell that the 
drugs must be given to Targo, or Loto will be killed— 
wait—when they have the drugs,” Aura translated in a 
swift, tense whisper, “then all of us they will kill.” She 



The Palace of Orlog 261 

shuddered. “And with the drugs they will rule as they 
desire—for evil.” 

“They’ll never get them,” the Very Young Man mut¬ 
tered. 

Targo’s brother leaned forward and raised a goblet 
from the table. The movement of his foot upon the floor 
made the two eavesdroppers jump aside to avoid being 
struck. 

Again Aura grasped her companion by the arm. “He 
is saying Loto is upstairs,” she whispered after a 
moment. “I know where.” 

“I knew it,” said the Very Young Man exultingly. 
“You take us there. Come on—let’s get out of here— 
we mustn't waste a minute.” 

They started back towards the wall nearest them—some 
fifty feet away—and following along its edge, ran down 
towards the doorway through which they had entered the 
room. They were still perhaps a hundred yards away 
from it, running swiftly, when there appeared in the door¬ 
way the feet and legs of two men who were coming in. 
The Wry Young Man and Aura stopped abruptly, shrink¬ 
ing up against the side of the wall. Then there came a 
a heavy metallic clanging sound; the two men entered the 
room, closing the door. 


CHAPTER XXXII 


AN ANT-HILL OUTRAGED 

**Y^TE’LL have to get smaller/’ said the Doctor. 

YY “There’s Rogers’ house.” 

They had been walking along the beach from the king’s 
palace hardly more than a hundred yards. The Doctor 
( and the Big Business Man were in front, and Oteo, wide- 
eyed and solemn, was close behind them. 

The Doctor was pointing down at the ground a few feet 
ahead. There, at a height just above their ankles, stood 
the Chemist’s house—a little building whose roof did not 
reach more than half-way to their knees, even though it 
stood on higher ground than the beach upon which they 
were walking. On the roof they could see two tiny 
figures—the Chemist and Lylda—waving their arms. 

The Big Business Man stopped short. “Now see ho-re, 
Frank, let’s understand this. We’ve been fooling with 
this thing too damned long. We’ve made a hell of a 
mess of it, you know that.” He spoke determinedly, with 
a profanity unusual with him. The Doctor did not an¬ 
swer. 

“We got here—yesterday. We found a peaceful 
world. Dissatisfaction in it—yes. But certainly a more 
peaceful world than the one we left. We’ve been here one 
day—one day, Frank, and now look at things. This 
child, Loto—stolen. Jack disappeared—God knows 
what’s happened to him. A revolution—the whole place 
in an uproar. All in one day, since we took our place in 
this world and tried to mix up in its affairs. 

262 


An Ant-Hill Outraged 263 

“It’s time to call a halt, Frank. If only we can get 
Jack back. That’s the bad part—we’ve got to find Jack. 
And then get out; we don’t belong here anyway. It’s 
nothing to us—why, man, look at it.” He waved his arm 
out over the city. In the street beside them they could 
see a number of little figures no bigger than their fingers, 
staring up into the air. “What is all that to us now, as 
we stand here. Nothing. Nothing but a kid’s toy; with 
little animated mannikins for a child to play with.” 

“We’ve got to find Jack,” said the Doctor. 

“Certainly we have—and then get out. We’re oniy 
hurting these little creatures, anyway, by being here.” 

“But there’s Rogers and Lylda,” added the Doctor. 
“And Loto and Lylda’s sister.” 

“Take them with us. They’ll have to go—they can’t 
stay here now. But we must find Jack—that’s the main 
thing.” 

“Look,” the Doctor said, moving forward. “They’re 
shouting to us.” 

They walked up and bent over the Chemist’s house. 
Their friend was making a funnel of his hands and try¬ 
ing to attract their attention. The Big Business Man 
knelt upon the beach and put his head down beside the 
house. “Make yourselves smaller,” he heard the Chemist 
shouting in a shrill little voice. 

“We think it best not to. You must come up to us. 
Serious things have happened. Take the drug now— 
then we’ll tell you.” The Big Business Man, with his 
knees upon the beach, had one hand on the sand and the 
other at the gate of Lylda’s garden. His face was just 
above the roof-top. 

The two little figures consulted a moment; then the 
Chemist shouted up, “All right; wait,” and he and Lylda 
disappeared into the house. A moment afterwards they 
reappeared in the garden; Eena was with them. They 



264 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

crossed the garden and turned into the street towards the 
flight of steps that led down to the lake. 

The Big Business Man had regained his feet and was 
standing ankle-deep in the water talking to the Doctor 
when Oteo suddenly plucked at his sleeve. 

“The Master—” he cried. The youth was staring 
down into the street, with a look of terror on his face. 
The Big Business Man followed the direction of his 
glance; at the head of the steps a number of men 
had rushed upon the Chemist and the two women, and 
were dragging them back up the hill. The Big Business 
Man hesitated only a moment; then he reached down and 
plucking a little figure from one of the struggling groups, 
flung it back over his shoulder into the lake. 

The other assailants did not run, as he had expected, 
so he gently pried them apart with his fingers from their 
captives, and, one by one, flung them into the air behind 
him. One who struck Lylda, he squashed upon the flag¬ 
stones of the street with his thumb. 

Only one escaped. He had been holding Eena; when 
he saw he was the last, he suddenly dropped his captive 
and ran shrieking up the hill into the city. 

The Big Business Man laughed grimly, and got upon 
his feet a little unsteadily. His face was white. 

“You see, Frank,” he said, and his voice trembled a 
little. “Good God, suppose we had been that size, too.” 

In a few moments more the Chemist, Lylda and Eena 
had taken the drug and were as large as the others. All 
six stood in the water beside the Chemist’s house. The 
Chemist had not spoken while he was growing; now he 
greeted his friends quietly. “A close call, gentlemen. I 
thank you.” He smiled approvingly at the Big Business 
Man. 

Eena and Oteo stood apart from the others. The girl 
was obviously terror-stricken by the experiences she had 


An Ant-Hill Outraged 265 

undergone. Oteo put his arm across her shoulders, and 
spoke to her reassuringly. 

“Where is Jack?” Lylda asked anxiously. “And my 
father—and Aura?” The Big Business Man thought her 
face looked years older than when he had last seen it. 
Her expression was set and stern, but her eyes stared into 
his with a gentle, sorrowful gaze that belied the sternness 
of her lips. 

They told her, as gently as they could, of the death of 
her father and the disappearance of the Very Young 
Man, presumably with Aura. She bore up bravely under 
the news of her father’s death, standing with her hand on 
her husband’s arm, and her sorrowful eyes fixed upon 
the face of the Big Business Man who haltingly told what 
had befallen them. When he came to a description of the 
attack on the palace, the death of the king, and the tri¬ 
umph of Targo, the Chemist raised his hands with a hope¬ 
less gesture. 

The Doctor put in: “It’s a serious situation—most 
serious.” 

“There's only one thing we can do,” the Big Business 
Man added quickly. “We must find Jack and your sis¬ 
ter,” he addressed Lylda, whose eyes had never left his 
face, “and then get out of this world as quickly as we 
can—before we do it any more harm.” 

The Chemist began pacing up and down the strip of 
the beach. He had evidently reached the same conclusion 
—that it was hopeless to continue longer to cope with so 
desperate a situation. But he could not bring himself so 
easily to a realization that his life in this world, of which 
he had been so long virtually the leader, was at an end. 
He strode back and forth thinking deeply; the water that 
he kicked idly splashed up sometimes over the houses of 
the tiny city at his side. 

The Big Business Man went on, “It’s the only way— 


266 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

the best way for all of us and for this little world, too.” 

“The best way for you—and you.” Lylda spoke 
softly and with a sweet, gentle sadness. “It is best for 

you, my friends. But for me-” She shook her 

head. 

The Big Business Man laid his hands gently on her 
shoulders. “Best for you, too, little woman. And for 
these people you love so well. Believe me—it is.” 

The Chemist paused in his walk. “Probably Aura and 
Jack are together. No harm has come to them so far— 
that’s certain. If his situation were desperate he would 
have made himself as large as we are and we would see 
him.” 

“If he got the chance,” the Doctor murmured. 

“Certainly he has not been killed or captured,” the 
Chemist reasoned, “for we would have other giants to 
face immediately that happened.” 

“Perhaps he took the girl with him and started off to 
Orlog to find Loto,” suggested the Doctor. “That crazy 
boy might do anything.” 

“He should be back by now, even if he had,” said the 
Big Business Man. “I don’t see how anything could 
happen to him—having those-” He stopped abruptly. 

While they had been talking a crowd of little people had 
gathered in the city beside them—a crowd that thronged 
the street before the Chemist’s house, filled the open space 
across from it and overflowed down the steps leading to 
the beach. It was uncanny, standing there, to see these 
swarming little creatures, like ants whose hill had been 
desecrated by the foot of some stray passer-by. They 
were enraged, and with an ant’s unreasoning, desperate 
courage they were ready to fight and to die, against an 
enemy irresistibly strong. 

“Good God, look at them,” murmured the Big Business 

Man in awe. 




An Ant-Hill Outraged 267 

The steps leading to the beach were black with them 
now—a swaying, struggling mass of little human forms, 
men and women, hardly a finger’s length in height, com¬ 
ing down in a steady stream and swarming out upon the 
beach. In a few moments the sand was black with them, 
and always more appeared in the city above to take their 
places. 

The Big Business Man felt a sharp sting in his foot 
above the sandal. One of the tiny figures was clinging to 
its string and sticking a sword into his flesh. Involun¬ 
tarily he kicked; a hundred of the little creatures were 
swept aside, and when he put his foot back upon the 
sand he could feel them smash under his tread. Their 
faint, shrill, squeaking shrieks had a ghostly semblance 
to human voices, and he turned suddenly sick and faint. 

Then he glanced at Lylda’s face; it bore an expression 
of sorrow and of horror that made him shudder. To 
him at first these had been savage, vicious little insects, 
annoying, but harmless enough if one kept upon one’s 
feet; but to her, he knew, they were men and women— 
misguided, frenzied—but human, thinking beings like 
herself. And he found himself wondering, vaguely, what 
he should do to repel them. 

The attack was so unexpected, and came so quickly 
that the giants had stood motionless, watching it with 
awe. Before they realized their situation the sand was 
so crowded with the struggling little figures that none of 
them could stir without trampling upon scores. 

Oteo and Eena, standing ankle-deep in the water, were 
unattacked, and at a word from the Chemist the others 
joined them, leaving little heaps of mangled human forms 
upon the beach where they had trod. 

All except Lylda. She stood her ground—her face 
bloodless, her eyes filled with tears. Her feet were cov¬ 
ered now; her ankles bleeding from a dozen tiny knives 


268 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

hacking at her flesh. The Chemist called her to him, but 
she only raised her arms with a gesture of appeal. 

“Oh, my husband,” she cried. “Please, I must. Let 
me take the drug now and grow small—like them. Then 
will they see we mean them no harm. And I shall 
tell them we are their friends—and you, the Master, mean 
only good-” 

The Big Business Man started forward. “They’ll kill 
her. God, that’s-” But the Chemist held them back. 

“Not now, Lylda,” he said gently. “Not now. Don’t 
you see? There’s nothing you can do; it’s too late now.” 
He met her gaze unyielding. For a moment she stared; 
then her figure swayed and with a low sob she dropped in 
a heap upon the sand. 

As Lylda fell, the Chemist leaped forward, the other 
three men at his side. A strident cry came up from the 
swarming multitude, and in an instant hundreds of them 
were upon her, climbing over her and thrusting their 
swords into her body. 

The Chemist and the Big Business Man picked her up 
and carried her into the water, brushing off the fighting 
little figures that still clung to her. There they laid her 
down, her head supported by Eena, who knelt in the 
water beside her mistress. 

The multitude on the sand crowded up to the water's 
edge; hundreds, forced forward by the pressure of those 
behind, plunged in, swam about, or sank and were rolled 
back by the surf, lifeless upon the shore. The beach 
crawled with their struggling forms, only the spot where 
Lylda had fallen was black and still. 

“She’s all right,” said the Doctor after a moment, bend¬ 
ing over Lylda. A cry from Oteo made him straighten 
up quickly. Out over the horizon, towards Orlog, there 
appeared the dim shape of a gigantic human form, and 
behind it others, Jaint and blurred against the stars! 





CHAPTER XXXIII 


THE RESCUE OF LOTO 

T HE Very Young Man heard the clang of the clos¬ 
ing door with sinking heart. The two newcomers, 
passing close to him and Aura as they stood shrinking up 
against the wall, joined their friends at the table. The 
V r ery Young Man turned to Aura with a solemn face. 
“Are there any other doors ?” he asked. 

The girl pointed. “One other, there—but see, it, too, 
is closed.” 

Far across the room the Very Young Man could make 
out a heavy metal door similar to that through which they 
had entered. It was closed—he could see that plainly. 
And to open it—so huge a door that its great golden 
handle hung nearly a hundred feet above them—was an 
utter impossibility. 

The Very Young Man looked at the windows. There 
were four of them, all on one side of the room—enor¬ 
mous curtained apertures, two hundred feet in length and 
half as broad—but none came even within fifty feet of 
the floor. The Very Young Man realized with dismay 
that there was apparently no way of escape out of the 
room. 

“We can’t get out, Aura,” he said, and in spite of him 
his voice trembled. “There’s no way.” 

The girl had no answer but a quiet nod of agreement. 
Her face was serious, but there was on it no sign of 
panic. The Very Young Man hesitated a moment; then 
he started off down the room towards one of the doors, 

with Aura close at his side. 

269 


Thr Gir] jtz tiit Golden At&m 

# 

Thfv coma do: re: on in their nresm: sice hr av 
Nor wotJd they dare make themselves snfkoenty iarp-f r: 
Qpetfkdoor, orcfiB^ dro^ cKcrfflg ^iato i^ ewa 
if the roam had been nearer the rronni that a lanmTT 
wan Long; he: ore dxr oooM escape lk| Mali he db- 
covered and seized. 

The Very Yonng Man tried t: thank :: on dearly He 
knew, except for a possible accident. or a unsealccdaiior 
or his part, that they v ere in no ra. danger : r he 
did rot want to make a false move art 03 for the frs: 
time be realised his respansahediry to An and reran rr 
repre: the rashness of fas nmaaro 

Thev could uraia. of coarse, rh the cmferenoe rvas 

♦ ^ “ 

over, and then sap on unnoticed, an the try Yncrnp 
Man felt tha: the chances of their resmry Toro art 
greater tow than they vra: :»e nro:;a:iy at aery nme .a 
the mart. They m ret on on he - as c: mam a :: 
that. Bn hois' ? 

Thev v ere a: the door n a arm mart Snaar 
so host it seemea, o?v. 1 tremendous ay r ~ • ~p of 

sknag adaL They vafted its and Af smA- 

denry the try 1 ony Man had an dea He aanew '-- 

self face doirn am on the fiooer Yndemeaah the dorrs 
iov'er edge there vt5 a am track. To toe of ra.mai 
Oro:d sice it urood ha t teen mnaa-cea: a—a sont 
harcQy so area: as the ahatkness tf a am sheet a: rater 
Bn the > ery Y ony I Tan at 1 set :r ohanH: At raaref 
its sice by sappaty the tape tf his root rat aa 

Tads crack was formed by the honor: tf the botr and 
me itvel surface of the note: mere vn or The dotr 

ms perfeoty harry for the crack seemed x be cf mterr: 
sine. The d ery Yany ITan sht vtd it at A im 

“There s the ry an he mistered- "TrrcaH there 
n: then large again or the tther -ode 

cat made ids caacadaam of size me far an d theta 
























271 


The Rescue of Loto 

crushing one of the pills into powder, divided a portion 
of it between himself and the girl. Aura seemed tired 
and the drug made her very dizzy. They both sat upon 
the stone floor, close up to the door, and closed their eyes. 
When, by the feeling of the floor beneath them, they knew 
the action of the drug was over, they stood up unsteadily 
and looked around them. 

They now found themselves standing upon a great 
stone plain. The ground beneath their feet was rough, 
but as far away as they could see, out up to the horizon, 
it was mathematically level. This great expanse was 
empty except in one place; over to the right there appeared 
a huge, irregular, blurred mass that might have been, by 
its look, a range of mountains. But the mass moved as 
they stared at it, and the Very Young Man knew it was 
the nearest one of Targo’s men, sitting beside the table. 

In the opposite direction, perhaps a hundred yards away 
from where they were standing, they could see the bottom 
of the door. It hung in the air some fifty feet above the 
surface of the ground. They walked over and stood un¬ 
derneath; like a great roof it spread over them—a flat, 
level surface parallel with the floor beneath. 

At this extraordinary change in their surroundings 
Aura seemed frightened, but seeing the matter-of-fact 
way in which her companion acted, she maintained her 
composure and soon was much interested in this new 
aspect of things. The Very Young Man took a last care¬ 
ful look around and then, holding Aura by the hand, 
started to cross under the door in a direction he judged 
to be at right angles to its length. 

They walked swiftly, trying to keep their sense of direc¬ 
tion, but having no means of knowing whether they were 
doing so or not. For perhaps ten minutes they walked; 
then they emerged on the other side of the door and 
again faced a great level, empty expanse. 


2J2 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

“We’re under,” the Very Young Man remarked with 
relief. “Do you know where Loto is from here?” 

Aura had recovered her self-possession sufficiently to 
smile. 

“I might, perhaps,” she answered, with a pretty little 
shrug. “But it’s a long way, don't you think? A hun¬ 
dred miles, it may be?'’ 

“We get large here,” said the Very Young Man, with 
an answering smile. He was greatly relieved to be out¬ 
side the audience room; the way seemed easy before them 
now. 

They took the opposite drug, and after several succes¬ 
sive changes of size, succeeded in locating the upper room 
in the palace in which Loto was held. At this time they 
were about the same relative size to their enemies as when 
they entered the audience chamber on the floor below. 

“That must be it,” the Very Young Man whispered, as 
they cautiously turned a hallway corner. A short dis¬ 
tance beyond, in front of a closed door, sat two guards. 

“That is the room of which they spoke,” Aura an¬ 
swered. “Only one door there is, I think.” 

“That’s all right,” said the Very Young Man confi¬ 
dently. “We’ll do the same thing—go under the door.” 

They went close up to the guards, who were sitting 
upon the floor playing some sort of a game with little 
golden balls. This door, like the other, had a space be¬ 
neath it, rather wider than the other, and in ten minutes 
more the Very Young Man and Aura were beneath it, and 
inside the room. 

As they grew larger again the Very Young Man at 
first thought the room was empty. “There he is,” cried 
Aura happily. The Very Young Man looked and could 
see across the still huge room, the figure of Loto, stand¬ 
ing at a window opening. 

“Don’t let him see us till we’re his size,” cautioned the 


The Rescue of Loto 273 

Very Young Man. “It might frighten him. And if he 

made any noise-” He looked at the door behind 

them significantly. 

Aura nodded eagerly; her face was radiant. Steadily 
larger they grew. Loto did not turn round, but stood 
quiet, looking out of the window. 

They crept up close behind him, and when they were 
normal size Aura whispered his name softly. The boy 
turned in surprise and she faced him with a warning fin¬ 
ger on her lips. He gave a low, happy little cry, and in 
another instant was in her arms, sobbing as she held him 
close to her breast. 

The Very Young Man’s eyes grew moist as he watched 
them, and heard the soft Oroid words of endearment 
they whispered to each other. He put his arms around 
them, too, and all at once he felt very big and very strong 
beside these two delicate, graceful little creatures of 
whom he was protector. 

A noise in the hallway outside brought the Very Young 
Man to himself. 

“We must get out,” he said swiftly. “There’s no time 
to lose.” He went to the window; it faced the city, fifty 
feet or more above the ground. 

The Very Young Man make a quick decision. “If we 
go out the way we came, it will take a very long time,” he 
explained. “And we might be seen. I think we’d better 
take the quick way; get big here—get right out,” he 
waved his hands towards the roof, “and make a run for 
it back to Arite.” 

He made another calculation. The room in which they 
were was on the top floor of the palace; Aura had told 
him that. It was a room about fifty feet in length, tri¬ 
angular in shape, and some thirty feet from floor to ceil¬ 
ing. The Very Young Man estimated that when they had 
grown large enough to fill the room, they could burst 



274 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

through the palace roof and leap to the ground. Then in 
a short time they could run over the country, back to 
Arite. He measured out the drug carefully, and without 
hesitation his companions took what he gave them. 

As they all three started growing—it was Loto’s first 
experience, and he gave an exclamation of fright at the 
sensation and threw his arms around Aura again—the 
Very Young Man made them sit upon the floor near the 
center of the room. He sat himself beside them, staring 
up at the ceiling that was steadily folding up and coming 
down towards them. For some time he stared, fascinated 
by its ceaseless movement. 

Then suddenly he realized with a start that it was al¬ 
most down upon them. He put up his hand and touched 
it, and a thrill of fear ran over him. He looked around. 
Beside him sat Aura and Loto, huddled close together. 
The walls of the room had nearly closed in upon them 
now; its few pieces of furniture had been pushed aside, 
unnoticed, by the growth of their enormous bodies. It 
was as though they were crouching in a triangular box, 
almost entirely filling it. 

The Very Young Man laid his hand on Aura’s arm, and 
she met his anxious glance with her fearless, trusting 
smile. 

“We’ll have to break through the roof now,” whispered 
the Very Young Man, and the girl answered calmly: 
“What you say to do, we will do.” 

Their heads were bent down now by the ever-lowering 
ceiling; the Very Young Man pressed his shoulder against 
it and heaved upwards. He could feel the floor under 
him quiver and the roof give beneath his thrust, but he 
did not break through. In sudden horror he wondered 
if he could. If he did not, soon, they would be crushed 
to death by their own growth within the room. 

The Very Young Man knew there was still time to take 


The Rescue of Loto 275 

the other drug. He shoved again, but with the same re¬ 
sult. Their bodies were bent double now. The ceiling 
was pressing close upon them; the walls of the room were 
at their elbow. The Very Young Man crooked his arm 
through the little square orifice window that he found at 
his side, and, with a signal to his companions, all three in 
unison heaved upwards with all their strength. There 
came one agonizing instant of resistance; then with a 
wrenching of wood, the clatter of falling stones and a 
sudden crash, they burst through and straightened up¬ 
right into the open air above. 

The Very Young Man sat still for a moment, breathing 
hard. Overhead stretched the canopy of stars; around 
lay the city, shrunken now and still steadily diminishing. 
Then he got unsteadily upon his feet, pulling his com¬ 
panions up with him and shaking the bits of stone and 
broken wood from him as he did so. 

In a moment more the palace roof was down to their 
knees, and they stepped out of the room. They heard a 
cry from below and saw the two guards, standing amidst 
the debris, looking up at them through the torn roof in 
fright and astonishment. 

There came other shouts from within the palace now, 
and the sound of the hurrying of many little feet. For 
some minutes more they grew larger, as they stood upon 
the palace roof, clinging to one another and listening to 
the spreading cries of excitement within the building and 
in the city streets below them. 

“Come on,” said the Very Young Man finally, and he 
jumped off the roof into the street. A group of little 
figures scattered as he landed, and he narrowly escaped 
treading upon them. 

So large had they grown that it was hardly more than 
a step down from the roof; Aura and Loto were by the 
Very Young Man’s side in a moment, and immediately 


276 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

they started off, picking their way single file out of the 
city. For a short time longer they continued growing; 
when they had stopped the city houses stood hardly above 
their ankles. 

It was difficult walking, for the street was narrow and 
the frightened people in it were often unable to avoid 
their tread, but fortunately the palace stood near the edge 
of the city, and soon they were past its last houses and 
out into the open country. 

“Well, we did it,” said the Very Young Man, exult¬ 
ing. Then he patted Loto affectionately upon the shoul¬ 
der, adding. “Well, little brother, we got you back, 
didn’t we ?” 

Aura stopped suddenly. “Look there—at Arite,” she 
said, pointing up at the horizon ahead of them. 

Far in the distance, at the edge of the lake, and beside 
a dim smudge he knew to be the houses of Arite, the 
Very Young Man saw the giant figure of a man, huge as 
himself, towering up against the background of sky. 


CHAPTER XXXIV 


THE DECISION 

4 IANTS!” exclaimed the Doctor, staring across 

\JT the country towards Orlog. There was dismay 
in his voice. 

The Big Business Man, standing beside him, clutched 
at his robe. “How many do you make out; they look 
like three to me.” 

The Doctor strained his eyes into the dim, luminous 
distance. “Three, I think—one taller than the others; it 
must be Jack.” His voice was a little husky, and held 
none of the confidence his words were intended to convey. 

Lylda was upon her feet now, standing beside the 
Chemist. She stared towards Orlog searchinglv, then 
turned to him and said quietly, “It must be Jack and 
Aura, with Loto.” She stopped with quivering lips; then 
with an obvious effort went on confidently. “It cannot 
be that the God you believe in would let anything happen 
to them.” 

“They’re coming this way—fast,” said the Big Business 
Man. “We’ll know in a few moments.” 

The figures, plainly visible now against the starry back¬ 
ground, were out in the open country, half a mile per¬ 
haps from the lake, and were evidently rapidly approach¬ 
ing Arite. 

“If it should be Targo’s men,” the Big Business Man 
added, “we must take more of the drug. It is death then 
for them or for us.” 

In silence the six of them stood ankle deep in the water 

277 


278 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

waiting. The multitude of little people on the beach and 
in the near-by city streets were dispersing now. A steady 
stream was flowing up the steps from the beach, and 
back into the city. Five minutes more and only a fringe 
of those in whom frenzy still raged remained at the 
water’s edge; a few of these, more daring, or more un¬ 
reasoning than the others, plunged into the lake and 
swam about the giants’ ankles unnoticed. 

Suddenly Lylda gave a sigh of relief. “Aura it is,’’ 
she cried. “Can you not see, there at the left? Her 
short robe—you see—and her hair, flowing down so long; 
no man is that.” 

“You’re right,” said the Big Business Man. “The 
smallest one on this side is Loto; I can see him. And 
Jack is leading. It’s all right; they’re safe. Thank 
God for that; they’re safe, thank God!” The fervent re¬ 
lief in his voice showed what a strain he had been under. 

It was Jack; a moment more left no doubt of that. 
The Big Business Man turned to the Chemist and Lylda, 
where they stood close together, and laying a hand upon 
the shoulder of each said with deep feeling: “We have 
all come through it safely, my friends. And now the 
way lies clear before us. We must go back, out of this 
world, to which we have brought only trouble. It is the 
only way; you must see that.” 

Lylda avoided his eyes. 

“All through it safely,” she murmured after him. “All 
safe except—except my father.” Her arm around the 
Chemist tightened. “All safe—except those.” She 
turned her big, sorrowful eyes towards the beach, where 
a thousand little mangled figures lay dead and dying. 
“All safe—except those.” 

It was only a short time before the adventurers from 
Orlog arrived, and Loto was in his mother’s arms. The 
Very Young Man, with mixed feelings of pride at his ex- 


The Decision 279 

ploit and belief at being freed from so grave a responsi¬ 
bility, happily displayed Aura to his friends. 

“Gosh; I’m glad we’re all together again; it had me 
scared, that’s a fact.” His eye fell upon the beach. 
“Great Scott, you’ve been having a fight, too? Look at 
that.” The Big Business Man and the Doctor outlined 
briefly what had happened, and the Very Young Man an¬ 
swered in turn with an account of his adventures. 

Aura joined her sister and Loto. The Chemist after a 
moment stood apart from the others thinking deeply. 
He had said little during all the events of the afternoon 
and evening. Now he reached the inevitable decision that 
events had forced upon him. His face was very serious 
as he called his companions around him. 

“We must decide at once,” he began, looking from one 
to the other, “what we are to do. Our situation here has 
become intolerable—desperate. I agree with you,” his 
glance rested on the Big Business Man an instant; “by 
staying here we can only do harm to these misguided 
people.” 

“Of course,” the Big Business Man interjected under 
his breath. 

“If the drugs should ever get out of our possession 
down here, immeasurable harm would result to this world, 
as well as causing our own deaths. If we leave now, we 
save ourselves; although we leave the Oroids ruled by 
Targo. But without the power of the drugs, he can do 
only temporary harm. Eventually he will be overthrown. 
It is the best way, I think. And I am ready to leave.” 

“It’s the only way,” the Big Business Man agreed. 
“Don't you think so?” The Doctor and the Very Young 
Man both assented. 

“The sooner the better,” the Very Young Man added. 
He glanced at Aura, and the thought that flashed into 
his mind made his heart jump violently. 


28 o 


The Girl in the Golden Atom 


The Chemist turned to Lylda. “To leave your people,” 
he said gently, “I know how hard it is. But your way 
now lies with me—with us.” He pulled Loto up against 
him as he spoke. 

Lylda bowed her head. “You speak true, my hus¬ 
band, my way does lie with you. I cannot help the feel¬ 
ing that we should stay. But with you my way does 
lie; whither you direct, we shall go—for ever.” 

The Chemist kissed her tenderly. “My sister also?” 
he smiled gently at Aura. 

“My way lies with you, too,” the girl answered simply. 
“For no man here has held my heart.” 

The Very Young Man stepped forward. “Do we take 
them with us?” He indicated Oteo and Eena, who stood 
silently watching. 

“Ask them, Lylda,” said the«Chemist. 

Calling them to her, Lylda spoke to the youth and the 
girl in her native tongue. They listened quietly; Oteo 
with an almost expressionless stolidity of face, but with 
his soft, dog-like eyes fixed upon his mistress; Eena with 
heaving breast and trembling limbs. When Lylda paused 
they both fell upon their knees before her. She put her 
hands upon their heads and smiling wistfully, said in 
English: 

“So it shall be; with me you shall go, because that is 
what you wish.” 

The Very Young Man looked around at them all with 
satisfaction. “Then it’s all settled,” he said, and again 
his glance fell on Aura. He wondered why his heart was 
pounding so, and why he was so thrilled with happiness; 
and he was glad he was able to speak in so matter-of-fact 
a tone. 

“I don’t know how about you,” he added, “but, Great 
Scott, I’m hungry.” 

“Since we have decided to go,” the Chemist said, “we 


The Decision 281 

had better start as soon as possible. Are there things in 
the house, Lylda, that you care to take?” 

Lylda shook her head. “Nothing can I take but mem¬ 
ories of this world, and those would I rather leave.” 
She smiled sadly. “There are some things I would wish 
to do—my father-” 

“It might be dangerous to wait,” the Big Business 
Man put in hurriedly. “The sooner we start, the better. 
Another encounter would only mean more death.” He 
looked significantly at the beach. 

“We’ve got to eat,” said the Very Young Man. 

“If we handle the drugs right,” the Chemist said, “we 
can make the trip out in a very short time. When we 
get above the forest and well on our way we can rest 
safely. Let us start at once.” 

“We’ve got to eat,” the Very Young Man insisted. 
“And we’ve got to have food with us.” 

The Chemist smiled. “What you say is quite true, 
Jack, we have got to have food and water; those are the 
only things necessary to our trip.” 

“We can make ourselves small now and have supper,” 
suggested the Very Young Man. “Then we can fill up 
the bottles for our belts and take enough food for the 
trip.” 

“No, we won’t,” interposed the Big Business Man posi¬ 
tively. “We won’t get small again. Something might 

happen. Once we get through the tunnels-” He 

stopped abruptly. 

“Great Scott! We never thought of that,” ejaculated 
the Very Young Man, as the same thought occurred to 
him. “We’ll have to get small to get through the tunnels. 
Suppose there’s a mob there that won’t let us in ?” 

“Is there any other way up to the forest?” the Doctor 
asked. 

The Chemist shook his head. “There are a dozen dif- 




282 


The Girl in the Golden Atom 


ferent tunnels, all near here, and several at Orlog, that all 
lead to the upper surface. But I think that is the only 
way.” 

“They might try to stop us,” the Big Business Man sug¬ 
gested. “We certainly had better get through them as 
quickly as we possibly can.” 

It was Aura who diffidently suggested the plan they 
finally adopted. They all reduced their size first to about 
the height of the Chemist’s house. Then the Very Young 
Man prepared to make himself sufficiently small to get 
the food and water-bottles, and bring them up to the larger 
size. 

“Keep your eye on me,” he warned. “Somebody 
might jump on me.” 

.They stood around the house, while the Very Young 
Man, in the garden, took the drug and dwindled in stature 
to Oroid size. There were none of the Oroids in sight, 
except some on the beach and others up the street silently 
watching. As he grew smaller the Very Young Man sat 
down wearily in the wreck of what once had been Lylda’s 
beautiful garden. He felt very tired and hungry, and his 
head was ringing. 

When he was no longer changing size he stood up in 
the garden path. The house, nearly its proper dimensions 
once more, was close at hand, silent and deserted. Aura 
stood in the garden beside it, her shoulders pushing aside 
the great branches of an overhanging tree, her arm rest¬ 
ing upon the roof-top. The Very Young Man waved 
up at her and shouted: “Be out in a minute,” and then 
plunged into the house. 


CHAPTER XXXV 


GOOD-BY TO ARITE 

O NCE inside he went swiftly to the room where they 
had left their water-bottles and other paraphernalia. 
He found them without difficulty, and retraced his steps 
to the door he had entered. Depositing his load near 
it, he went back towards the room which Lylda had de¬ 
scribed to him, and in which the food was stored. 

Walking along this silent hallway, listening to the 
echoes of his own footsteps on its stone floor, the Very 
Young Man found himself oppressed by a feeling of im¬ 
pending danger. He looked back over his shoulder—once 
he stood quite still and listened. But he heard nothing; 
the house was quite silent, and smiling at his own fear he 
went on again. 

Selecting the food they needed for the trip took him 
but a moment. He left the storeroom, his arms loaded, 
and started back toward the garden door. Several door¬ 
ways opened into the hall below, and all at once the Very 
Young Man found himself afraid as he passed them. He 
was within sight of the garden door, not more than twenty 
feet away, when he hesitated. Just ahead, at his right, 
an archway opened into a room beside the hall. The 
Very Young Man paused only an instant; then, ashamed 
of his fear, started slowly forward. He felt an impulse 
to run, but he did not. And then, from out of the silence, 
there came a low, growling cry that made his heart stand 
still, and the huge gray figure of a man leaped upon him 

and bore him to the ground. 

283 


284 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

As he went down, with the packages of food flying in 
all directions, the Very Young Man gripped the naked 
body of his antagonist tightly. He twisted round as he 
fell and lay with his foe partly on top of him. He knew 
instinctively that his situation was desperate. The man’s 
huge torso, with its powerful muscles that his arms en¬ 
circled, told him that in a fcbntest of strength such as this, 
inevitably he would find himself overcome. 

The man raised his fist to strike, and the Very Young 
Man caught him by the wrist. Over his foe’s shoulder 
now he could see the open doorway leading into the gar¬ 
den, not more than six or eight feet away. Beyond it 
lay safety; that he knew. He gave a mighty lunge and 
succeeded in rolling over toward the doorway. But he 
could not stay above his opponent, for the man’s greater 
strength lifted him up and over, and again pinned him to 
the floor. 

He was nearer the door now, and just beyond it he 
caught a glimpse of the white flesh of Aura’s ankle as 
she stood beside the house. The man put a hand on the 
Very Young Man’s throat. The Very Young Man 
caught it by the wrist, but he could feel the growing pres¬ 
sure of its fingers cutting off his breath. He tried to pull 
the hand back, but could not; he tried to twist his body 
free, but the weight of his foe held him tightly against the 
floor. A great roaring filled his ears; the hallway began 
fading from his sight. With a last despairing breath, 
he gave a choking cry: “Aura! Aura!” 

The man’s fingers at his throat loosened a little; he 
drew another breath, and his head cleared. His eyes 
were fixed on the strip of garden he could see beyond the 
doorway. Suddenly Aura’s enormous body came into 
view, as she stooped and then lay prone upon the ground. 
Her face was close to the door; she was looking in. The 
Very Young Man gave another cry, half stifled. And 


Good-By to Arite 285 

then into the hallway he saw come swiftly a huge hand, 
whose fingers gripped him and his antagonist and jerked 
them hurriedly down the hall and out into the garden. 

As they lay struggling on the ground outside, the Very 
Young Man felt himself held less closely. He wrenched 
himself free and sprang to hfs feet, standing close be¬ 
side Aura’s face. The man fi&as up almost as quickly, 
preparing again to spring upon his victim. Something 
moved behind the Very Young Man, and he looked up 
into the air hurriedly. The Big Business Man stood be¬ 
hind him ; the Very Young Man met his anxious glance. 

‘Tm all right/’ he shouted. His antagonist leaped for¬ 
ward and at the same instant a huge, flat object, that was 
the Big Business Man’s foot, swept through the air and 
mashed the man down into the dirt of the garden. The 
Very Young Man turned suddenly sick as he heard the 
agonized shriek and the crunching of the breaking bones. 
The Big Business Man lifted his foot, and the mangled 
figure lay still. The Very Young Man sat down sud¬ 
denly in the garden path and covered his face with his 
hands. 

When he raised his head his friends were all standing 
round him, crowding the garden. The body of the man 
who had attacked him had disappeared. The Very 
Young Man looked up into Aura’s face—she was on her 
feet now with the others—and tried to smile. 

“I’m all right,” he repeated. “I’ll go get the food and 
things.” 

In a few minutes more he had made himself as large as 
his companions, and had brought with him most of the 
food. There still remained in the smaller size the water- 
bottles, some of the food, the belts with which to carry it, 
and a few other articles they needed for the trip. 

“I’ll get them,” said the Big Business Man; “you sit 
down and rest.” 






286 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

The Very Young Man was glad to do as he was told, 
and sat beside Aura in the garden, while the Big Business 
Man brought up to their size the remainder of the supplies. 

When they had divided the food, and all were equipped 
for the journey, they started at once for the tunnels. 
Lylda’s eyes again filled with tears as she left so sum¬ 
marily, and probably for the last time, this home in which 
she had been so happy. 

As they passed the last houses of the city, heading to¬ 
wards the tunnel entrances that the Chemist had selected, 
the Big Business Man and the Chemist walked in front, 
the others following close behind them. A crowd of 
Oroids watched them leave, and many others were to be 
seen ahead; but these scattered as the giants approached. 
Occasionally a few stood their ground, and these the Big 
Business Man mercilessly trampled under foot. 

“It's the only way; I’m sorry,” he said, half apologeti¬ 
cally. “We cannot take any chances now; we must get 
out.” 

“It’s shorter through these tunnels I’m taking,” the 
Chemist said after a moment. 

“My idea,” said the Big Business man, “is that we 
should go through the tunnels that are the largest. 
They’re not all the same size, are they?” 

“No,” the Chemist answered; “some are a little larger.” 

“You see,” the Big Business Man continued, “I figure 
we are going to have a fight. They’re following us. 
Look at that crowd over there. They’ll never let us out 
if they can help it. When we get into the tunnels, natu¬ 
rally we’ll have to be small enough to walk through them. 
The larger we are the better; so let’s take the very big¬ 
gest.” 

“These are,” the Chemist answered. “We can make 
it at about so high.” He held his hand about the level 
of his waist. 


Good-By to Arite 287 

“That won’t be so bad,” the Big Business Man com¬ 
mented. 

Meanwhile the Very Young Man, walking with Aura 
behind the leaders, was talking to her earnestly. He 
was conscious of a curious sense of companionship with 
this quiet girl—a companionship unlike anything he had 
ever felt for a girl before. And now that he was taking 
her with him, back to his own world- 

“Climb out on to the surface of the ring,” he was 
saying, “and then, in a few minutes more, we’ll be 
there. Aura, you cannot realize how wonderful it will 
be.” 

The girl smiled her quiet smile; her face was sad with 
the memory of what she was leaving, but full of youthful, 
eager anticipation of that which lay ahead. 

“So much has happened, and so quickly, I cannot real¬ 
ize it yet, I know,” she answered. “But that it will be 
very wonderful, up there above, I do believe. And I am 
glad that we are going, only-” 

The Very Young Man took her hand, holding it a mo¬ 
ment. “Don’t, Aura. You mustn't think of that.” He 
spoke gently, with a tender note in his voice. 

“Don’t think of the past, Aura,” he went on earnestly. 
“Think only of the future—the great cities, the opera, the 
poetry I am going to teach you.” 

The girl laid her hand on his arm. “You are so kind, 
my friend Jack. You will have much to teach me, will 
you not? Is it sure you will want to? I shall be like a 
little child up there in your great world.” 

An answer sprang to the Very Young Man’s lips— 
words the thinking of which made his heart leap into his 
throat. But before he could voice them Loto ran up to 
him from behind, crying. “I want to walk by you, Jack; 
maniita, talks of things I know not.” 

The Very Young Man put his arm across the child’s 




2 88 


The Girl in the Golden Atom 


shoulders. “Well, little boy,” he said laughing, “how do 
you like this adventure?” 

“Never have I been in the Great Forests,” Loto an¬ 
swered, turning his big, serious eyes up to his friend's 
face. “I shall not be afraid—with my father, and 
mamita, and with you.” 

“The Great Forests won’t seem very big, Loto, after a 
little while,” the Very Young Man said. “And of course 
you won’t be afraid of anything. You're going to see 
many things, Loto—very many strange and wonderful 
things for such a little boy.” 

They reached the entrance to the tunnel in a few mo¬ 
ments more, and stopped before it. As they approached, 
a number of little figures darted into its luminous black¬ 
ness and disappeared. There were none others in sight 
now, except far away towards Arite, where perhaps a 
thousand stood watching intently. 

The tunnel entrance, against the side of a hill, stood 
nearly breast high. 

“I’m wrong,” said the Chemist, as the others came up. 
“It’s not so high all the way through. We shall have to 
make ourselves much smaller than this.” 

“This is a good time to eat,” suggested the Very Young 
Man. The others agreed, and without making them¬ 
selves any smaller—the Big Business Man objected to that 
procedure—they sat down before the mouth of the tunnel 
and ate a somewhat frugal meal. 

“Have you any plans for the trip up?” asked the Doc¬ 
tor of the Chemist while they were eating. 

“I have,” interjected the Big Business Man, and the 
Chemist answered: 

“Yes, I am sure I can make it far easier than it was 
for me before. I’ll tell you as we go up; the first thing 
is to get through the tunnels.” 


Good-By to Ante 289 

“I don’t anticipate much difficulty in that,” the Doctor 
said. “Do you?” 

The Chemist shook his head. “No, I don’t.” 

“But we mustn’t take any chances,” put in the Big 
Business Man quickly. “How small do you suppose we 
should make ourselves?” 

The Chemist looked at the tunnel opening. “About 
half that,” he replied. 

“Not at the start,” said the Big Business Man. “Let’s 
go in as large as possible; we can get smaller when we 
have to.” 

It took them but a few minutes to finish the meal. 
They were all tired from the exciting events of the day, 
but the Big Business Man would not hear of their resting 
a moment more than was absolutely necessary. 

“It won’t be much of a trip up to the forests,” he ar¬ 
gued. “Once we get well on our way and into one of the 
larger sizes, we can sleep safely. But not now; it’s too 
dangerous.” 

They were soon ready to start, and in a moment more 
all had made themselves small enough to walk into the 
tunnel opening. They were, at this time, perhaps six 
times the normal height of an adult Oroid. The city of 
Arite, apparently much farther away now, was still visible 
up against the distant horizon. As they were about to 
start, Lylda, with Aura close behind her, turned to face 
it. 

“Good-by to our own world now we must say, my 
sister,” she said sadly. “The land that bore us—so 
beautiful a world, and once so kindly. We have been 
very happy here. And I cannot think it is right for me to 
leave.” 

“Your way lies with your husband,” Aura said gently. 
“You yourself have said it, and it is true.” 


290 The Girl in the Goldeji Atom 

Lylda raised her arms up towards the far-away city 
with a gesture almost of benediction. 

“Good future to you, land that I love.” Her voice 
trembled. “Good future to you, for ever and ever.” 

The Very Young Man, standing behind them with 
Loto, was calling: “They’re started; come on.” 

With one last sorrowful glance Lylda turned slowly, 
and, walking with her arm about her sister, followed the 
others into the depths of the tunnel. 


CHAPTER XXXVI 


THE FIGHT IN THE TUNNELS 

F OR some time this strange party of refugees from 
an outraged world walked in silence. Because of 
their size, the tunnel appeared to them now not more 
than eight or nine feet in height, and in most places of 
nearly similar width. For perhaps ten minutes no one 
spoke except an occasional monosyllable. The Chemist 
and Big Business Man, walking abreast, were leading; 
Aura and Lylda with the Very Young man, and Loto 
close in front of them, brought up the rear. 

The tunnel they were traversing appeared quite de¬ 
serted; only once, at the intersection of another smaller 
passageway, a few little figures—not more than a foot 
high—scurried past and hastily disappeared. Once the 
party stopped for half an hour to rest. 

“I don’t think we’ll have any trouble getting through,” 
said the Chemist. “The tunnels are usually deserted at 
the time of sleep.” 

The Big Business Man appeared not so sanguine, but 
said nothing. Finally they came to one of the large am¬ 
phitheaters into which several of the tunnels opened. In 
size, it appeared to them now a hundred feet in length and 
with a roof some twelve feet high. The Chemist stopped 
to let the others come up. 

“I think our best route is there,” he pointed. 

“It is not so high a tunnel; we shall have to get smaller. 
Beyond it they are larger again. It is not far—half an 

hour, perhaps, walking as we-” 

291 



'20)2 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

A cry from Aura interrupted him. 

“My brother, see, they come/’ she exclaimed. 

Before them, out of several of the smaller passageways, 
a crowd of little figures was pouring. There were no 
shouts; there was seemingly no confusion; just a steady, 
flowing stream of human forms, emptying from the tun¬ 
nels into the amphitheater and spreading out over its open 
surface. 

The fugitives stared a moment in horror. “Good God! 
they’ve got us,” the Doctor muttered, breaking the tense¬ 
ness of the silence. 

The little people kept their distance at first, and then 
as the open space filled up, slowly they began coming 
closer, in little waves of movement, irresistible as an in¬ 
coming tide. 

Aura turned towards the passageway through which 
they had entered. “We can go back,” she said. And 
then. “No—see, they come there, too.” A crowd of the 
little gray figures blocked that entrance also—a crowd 
that hesitated an instant and then came forward, spread¬ 
ing out fan-shape as it came. 

The Big Business Man doubled up his fists. 

“It’s fight,” he said grimly. “By God! we’ll-” but 

Lylda, with a low cry, flung herself before him. 

“No, no,” she said passionately. “Not that; it cannot 
be that now, just at the last-” 

Aura laid a hand upon her sister’s shoulder. 

“Wait, my sister,” she said gently. “There is no mat¬ 
ter of justice here—for you, a woman—to decide. This 
is for men to deal with—a matter for men—our men. 
And what they say to do—that must be done.” 

She turned to the Chemist and the Very Young Man, 
who were standing side by side. 

“A woman—cannot kill,” she said slowly. “Unless— 
her man—says it so. Or if to save him- ■* 





The Fight in the Tunnels 293 

Her eyes flashed fire; she held her slim little body erect 
and rigid—an Amazon ready to fight to the death for 
those she loved. 

The Chemist hesitated a moment. Before he could an¬ 
swer, a single shrill cry sounded from somewhere out in 
the silent, menacing throng. As though at a signal, a 
thousand little voices took it up, and with a great rush the 
crowd swept forward. 

In the first moment of surprise and indecision the group 
of fugitives stood motionless. As the wave of little, 
struggling human forms closed in around them, the Very 
Young Man came to himself with a start. He looked 
down. They were black around him now, swaying back 
and forth about his legs. Most of them were men, armed 
with the short, broad-bladed swords, or with smaller 
knives. Some brandished other improvised weapons; 
still others held rocks in their hands. 

A little pair of arms clutched the Very Young Man 
about his leg; he gave a violent kick, scattering a number 
of the struggling figures and clearing a space into which 
he leaped. 

“Back—Aura, Lylda,” he shouted. “Take Loto and 
Eena. Get back behind us.” 

The Big Business Man, kicking violently, and some¬ 
times stooping down to sweep the ground with great 
swings of his arm, had cleared a space before them. 
Taking Loto, who looked on with frightened eyes, the 
three women stepped back against the side wall of the 
amphitheater. 

The Very Young Man swiftly discarded his robe, stand¬ 
ing in the knitted under-suit in which he had swam the 
lake; the other men followed his example. For ten 
minutes or more in ceaseless waves, the little creatures 
threw themselves forward, and were beaten back. The 
confined space echoed with their shouts, and with the 


294 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

cries of the wounded. The five men fought silently. 
Once the Doctor stumbled and fell. Before his friends 
could get to him, his body was covered with his foes. 
When he got back upon his feet, knocking them off, he 
was bleeding profusely from an ugly-looking wound in 
his shoulder. 

“Good God!” he panted as the Chemist and the Big 
Business Man leaped over to him. “They’ll get us—if 
we go down.” 

“We can get larger,” said the Big Business Man, point¬ 
ing upwards to the roof overhead. “Larger—and 

then-” He swayed a trifle, breathing hard. His 

legs were covered with blood from a dozen wounds. 

Oteo, fighting back and forth before them, was hold¬ 
ing the crowd in check; a heap of dead lay in a semi¬ 
circle in front of him. 

“I’m going across,” shouted the Very Young Man sud¬ 
denly, and began striding forward into the struggling 
mass. 

The crowd, thus diverted, eased its attack for a mo¬ 
ment. Slowiy the Very Young Man waded into it. He 
was perhaps fifty feet out from the side wall when a stone 
struck him upon the temple. He went down, out of sight 
in the seething mass. 

“Come on,” shouted the Big Business Man. But 
before he could move, Aura dashed past him, fight¬ 
ing her way out to where the Very Young Man lay. 
In a moment she was beside him. Her fragile 
body seemed hopelessly inadequate for such a struggle, 
but the spirit within her made her fight like a wild¬ 
cat. 

Catching one of the little figures by the legs she flung 
him about like a club, knocking a score of the others back 
and clearing a space about the Very Young Man. Then 
abruptly she dropped her victim and knelt down, plucking 



The Fight in the Tunnels 295 

away the last of the attacking figures who was hacking 
at the Very Young Man’s arm with his sword. 

The Chemist and Big Business Man were beside her 
now, and together they carried the Very Young Man back. 
He had recovered consciousness, and smiled up at them 
feebly. They laid him on the ground against the wall, 
and Aura sat beside him. 

“Gosh, I’m all right,” he said, waving them away. 
“Be with you in a minute; give ’em hell!” 

The Doctor knelt beside the Very Young Man for a mo¬ 
ment, and, finding he was not seriously hurt, left him 
and rejoined the Chemist and Big Business Man, who, 
with Oteo, had forced the struggling mass of little figures 
some distance away. 

“I’m going to get larger,” shouted the Big Business 
Man a moment later. “Wipe them all out, damn it; I can 
do it. We can’t keep on this way.” 

The Doctor was by his side. 

“You can’t do it—isn’t room,” he shouted in answer, 
pausing as he waved one of his assailants in the air above 
his head. “You might take too much.” 

The Big Business Man was reaching with one hand un¬ 
der his robe. With his feet he kicked violently to keep 
the space about him clear. A tiny stone flew by his 
head; another struck him on the chest, and all at once he 
realized that he was bruised all over from where other 
stones had been hitting him. He looked across to the op¬ 
posite wall of the amphitheater. Through the tunnel 
entrance there he saw that the stream of little people was 
flowing the other way now. They were trying to get 
out, instead of pouring in. 

The Big Business Man waved his arms. “They’re run¬ 
ning away—look,” he shouted. “They’re running—over 
there—come on.” He dashed forward, and, followed by 
his companions, redoubled his efforts. 


296 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

The crowd wavered; the shouting grew less; those 
further away began running back. 

Then suddenly a shrill cry arose—just a single little 
voice it was at first. After a moment others took it up, 
and still others, until it sounded from every side—three 
Oroid words repeated over and over. 

The Chemist abruptly stopped fighting. “It’s done,” he 
shouted. “Thank God it’s over.” 

The cry continued. The little figures had ceased at¬ 
tacking now and were struggling in a frenzy to get 
through the tunnels. 

“No more,” shouted the Chemist. “They’re going. 
See them going? Stop.” 

His companions stood by his side, panting and weak 

from loss of blood. The Chemist tried to smile. His 
* 

face was livid; he swayed unsteadily on his feet. “No 
more,” he repeated. “It's over. Thank God, it’s over!” 

Meanwhile the Very Young Man, lying on the floor 
with Aura sitting beside him, revived a little. He tried 
to sit up after a few moments, but the girl pulled him 
down. 

“But I got to go—give ’em hell,” he protested weakly. 
His head was still confused; he only knew he should be 
back, fighting beside his friends. 

“Not yet,” Aura said gently. “There is no need— 
yet. When there is, you may trust me, Jack; I shall say 
it.” 

The Very Young Man closed his eyes. The blurred, 
iridescent outlines of the rocks confused him; his head 
was ringing. The girl put an arm under his neck. He 
found one of her hands, and held it tightly. For a mo¬ 
ment he lay silent. Then his head seemed to dear a little; 
he opened his eyes. 

“What are they doing now, Aura?” he asked. 

“It is no different,” the girl answered softly. “So ter- 




The Tight in the Tunnels 2gy 

rible a thing so terrible-’ she finished almost to her¬ 

self. 

111 wait—just a minute more,” he murmured and 
closed his eyes again. 

He held the girl’s hand tighter. He seemed to be float¬ 
ing away, and her hand steadied him. The sounds of the 
fighting sounded very distant now—all blurred and con¬ 
fused and dreamlike. Only the girl’s nearness seemed 
real—the touch of her little body against his as she sat 
beside him. 

“Aura,” he whispered. “Aura.” 

She put her face down to his. “Yes, Jack,” she 
answered gently. 

“It’s very bad—there—don't you think?” 

She did not answer. 

“I was just thinking,” he went on; he spoke slowly, al¬ 
most in a whisper. “Maybe—you know—we won’t come 
through this.” He paused ; his thoughts somehow seemed 
too big to put into words. But he knew he was very 
happy. 

“I was just thinking, Aura, that if we shouldn’t come 

through I just wanted you to know-” Again he 

stopped. From far away he heard the shrill, rhythmic cry 
of many voices shouting in unison. He listened, and 
then it all came back. The battle—his friends there fight¬ 
ing—they needed him. He let go of the girl’s hand and 
sat up, brushing back his moist hair. 

“Listen, Aura. Hear them shouting; I mustn’t stay 
here.” He tried, weakly, to get upon his feet, but the 
girl’s arm about his waist held him down. 

“Wait,” she said. Surprised by the tenseness of her 
tone, he relaxed. 

The cry grew louder, rolling up from a thousand voices 
and echoing back and forth across the amphitheater. 
The Very Young Man wondered vaguely what it could 




298 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

mean. He looked into Aura’s face. Her lips were 
smiling now. 

“What is it, Aura?” he whispered. 

The girl impulsively put her arms about him and held 
him close. 

“But we are coming through, my friend Jack. We are 
coming through.” The Very Young Man looked wonder- 
ingly into her eyes. “Don't you hear? That cry—the 
cry of fear and despair. It means—life to us; and no 
more death—to them.” 

The Chemist’s voice came out of the distance shouting: 
“They’re running away. It’s over; thank God it’s over!” 

Then the Very Young Man knew, and life opened up 
before him again. “Life,” he whispered to himself. 
“Life and love and happiness.” 


CHAPTER XXXVII 


A COMBAT OF TITANS 

I N a few minutes the amphitheater was entirely clear, 
save for the dead and maimed little figures lying scat¬ 
tered about; but it was nearly an hour more before the 
fugitives were ready to resume their journey. 

The attack had come so suddenly, and had demanded 
such immediate and continuous action that none of the 
men, with the exception of the Very Young Man, had 
had time to realize how desperate was the situation in 
which they had fallen. With the almost equally abrupt 
cessation of the struggle there came the inevitable reac¬ 
tion; the men bleeding from a score of wounds, weak 
from loss of blood, and sick from the memory of the 
things they had been compelled to do, threw themselves 
upon the ground utterly exhausted. 

“We must get out of here,” said the Doctor, after they 
had been lying quiet for a time, with the strident shrieks 
of hundreds of the dying little creatures sounding in their 
ears. “That was pretty near the end.” 

“It isn’t far,” the Chemist answered, “when we get 
started.” 

“We must get water,” the Doctor went on. “These 

cuts-” They had used nearly all their drinking-water 

washing out their wounds, which Aura and Lylda had 
bound up with strips of cloth torn from their garments. 

The Chemist got upon his feet. “There’s no water 
nearer than the Forest River,” he said. “That tunnel 

over there comes out very near it.” 

299 



300 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

“What makes you think we won't have another scrap 
getting out?” the Very Young Man wanted to know. 
He had entirely recovered from the effects of the stone 
that had struck him on the temple, and was in better con¬ 
dition than any of the other men. 

“Fm sure,” the Chemist said confidently, “they were 
through; they will not attack us again; for some time at 
least. The tunnels will be deserted.” 

The Big Business Man stood up also. 

“We’d better get going while we have the chance,” he 
said. “This getting smaller—I don’t like it.” 

They started soon after, and, true to the Chemist’s pre¬ 
diction, met no further obstacle to their safe passage 
through the tunnels. When they had reached the forest 
above, none of the little people were in sight. 

The Big Business Man heaved a long sigh of relief. 
“Thank goodness we’re here at last,” he said. “I didn’t 
realize how good these woods would look.” 

In a few minutes more they were at the edge of the 
river, bathing their wounds in its cooling water, and re¬ 
plenishing their drinking-bottles. 

“How do we get across?” the Very Young Man asked. 

“We won’t have to cross it,” the Chemist answered 
with a smile. “The tunnel took us under.” 

“Let’s eat here,” the Very Young Man suggested, “and 
take a sleep; we’re about all in.” 

“We ought to get larger first,” protested the Big Busi¬ 
ness Man. They were at this time about four times 
Oroid size; the forest trees, so huge when last.they had 
seen them, now seemed only rather large saplings. 

“Some one of us must stay awake,” the Doctor said. 
“But there do not seem to be any Oroids up here.” 

“What do they come up here for, anyway?” asked the 
Very Young Man. 


A Combat of Titans 301 

“There’s some hunting,” the Chemist answered. “But 
principally it’s the mines beyond, in the deserts.” 

They agreed finally to stop beside the river and eat 
another meal, and then, with one of them on guard, to 
sleep for a time before continuing their journey. 

The meal, at the Doctor’s insistence, was frugal to the 
extreme, and was soon over. They selected Oteo to stand 
guard first. The youth, when he understood what was 
intended, pleaded so with his master that the Chemist 
agreed. Utterly worn out, the travelers lay down on a 
mossy bank at the river’s edge, and in a few moments 
were all fast asleep. 

Oteo sat nearby with his back against a tree-trunk. 
Occasionally he got up and walked to and fro to fight off 
the drowsiness that came over him. 

How long the Very Young Man slept he never knew. 
He slept dreamlessly for a considerable time. When he 
struggled back to consciousness it was with a curious feel¬ 
ing of detachment, as though his mind no longer was con¬ 
nected with his body. He thought first of Aura, with a 
calm peaceful sense of happiness. For a long time he 
lay, drifting along with his thoughts and wondering 
whether he were asleep or awake. Then all at once he 
knew he was not asleep. His eyes were open; before 
him stood the forest trees at the river’s edge. And at 
the foot of one of the trees he could see the figure of 
Oteo, sitting hunched up with his head upon his hands, 
'fast asleep. 

Remembrance came to the Very Young Man, and he 
sat up with a start. Beside him his friends lay motion¬ 
less. He looked around, still a little confused. And 
then his heart leaped into his throat, for at the edge of 
the woods he saw a small, lean, gray figure—the little 


302 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

figure of a man who stood against a tree-trunk. The 
man’s face was turned towards him; he met the glisten¬ 
ing eyes looking down and saw the lips parted in a leer¬ 
ing smile. 

A thrill of fear ran over the Very Young Man as he 
recognized the face of Targo. And then his heart seemed 
to stop beating. For as he stared, fascinated, into the 
man’s mocking eyes, he saw that slowly, steadily he was 
growing larger. Mechanically the Very Young Man’s 
hand went to his armpit, his fingers fumbling at the 
pouch strapped underneath. The vial of chemicals was 
not there! 

For an instant more the Very Young Man continued 
staring. Then, with an effort, he turned his eyes away 
from the gaze that seemed to hypnotize him. Beside him 
the Chemist lay sleeping. He looked back at Targo, and 
saw him larger—almost as large now as he was himself. 

Like a cloak discarded, the Very Young Man’s be¬ 
wilderment dropped from him. He recognized the dan¬ 
ger, realized that in another moment this enemy would 
be irresistibly powerful—invincible. His mind was clear 
now, his nerves steady, his muscles tense. He knew the 
only thing he could do; he calculated the chances in a 
flash of thought. 

Still staring at the triumphant face of Targo, the Very 
Young Man jumped to his feet and swiftly bent over the 
sleeping form of the Chemist. Reaching through the 
neck of his robe he took out the vial of chemicals, and 
before his friend was fairly awake had swallowed one 
of the pills. 

As the Very Young Man sprang into action Targo 
turned and ran swiftly away, perhaps a hundred feet; 
then again he stopped and stood watching his intended 
victim with his sardonic smile. 

The Very Young Man met the Chemist’s startled eyes. 


A Combat of Titans 303 

“Targo!” said the Very Young Man swiftly. “He’s 
here; he stole the drug just now, while I was sleeping.” 

The Chemist opened his mouth to reply, but the Very 
Young Man bounded away. He could feel the drug be¬ 
ginning to work; the ground under his feet swayed un¬ 
steadily. 

Swiftly he ran straight towards the figure of Targo, 
where he stood leaning against a tree. His enemy did not 
move to run away, but stood quietly awaiting him. The 
Very Young Man saw he was now nearly the same size 
that Targo was; if anything, the larger. 

A fallen tree separated them; the Very Young Man 
cleared it with a bound. Still Targo stood motionless, 
awaiting his onslaught. Then abruptly he stooped to the 
ground, and a rock whistled through the air, narrowly 
missing the Very Young Man’s head. Before Targo 
could recover from the throw the Very Young Man was 
upon him, and they went down together. 

Back and forth over the soft ground they rolled, first 
one on top, then the other. The Very Young Man’s hand 
found a stone on the ground beside them. His fingers 
clutched it; he raised it above him. But a blow upon his 
forearm knocked it away before he could strike; and a 
sudden twist of his antagonist’s body rolled him over and 
pinned him upon his back. 

The Very Young Man thought of his encounter with 
Targo before, and again with sinking heart he realized he 
was the weaker of the two. He jerked one of his wrists 
free and, striking upwards with all his force, landed full 
on his enemy’s jaw. The man’s head snapped back, but 
he laughed—a grim, sardonic laugh that ended in a half 
growl, like a wild beast enraged. The Very Young 
Man’s blood ran cold. A sudden frenzy seized him; he 
put all his strength into one desperate lunge and, wrench¬ 
ing himself free, sprang to his feet. 


304 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

Targo was up almost as quickly as he, and for an in¬ 
stant the two stood eyeing each other, breathing hard. 
At the Very Young Man’s feet a little stream was flow¬ 
ing past. Vaguely he found himself thinking how peace¬ 
ful it looked; how cool and soothing the water would be 
to his bruised and aching body. Beside the stream his 
eye caught a number of tiny human figures, standing close 
together, looking up at him—little forms that a single 
sweep of his foot would have scattered and killed. A 
shiver of fear ran across him as in a flash he realized 
this other danger. With a cry, he leaped sidewise, away 
from the water. Beside him stood a little tree whose 
bushy top hardly reached his waist. He clutched its 
trunk with both hands and jerking it from the ground 
swung it at his enemy’s head, meeting him just as he 
sprang forward. The tree struck Targo a glancing blow 
upon the shoulder. With another laugh he grasped its 
roots and twisted it from the Very Young Man’s hand. 
A second more and they came together again, and the 
Very Young Man felt his antagonist’s powerful arms 
around his body, bending him backwards. 

The Big Business Man stood beside the others at the 
river’s edge, watching the gigantic struggle, the outcome 
of which meant life or death to them all. The grappling 
figures were ten times his own height before he fairly 
realized the situation. At first he thought he should 
take some of the drug also, and grow larger with them. 
Then he knew that he could not overtake their growth 
in time to aid his friend. The Chemist and the Doctor 
must evidently have reached the same conclusion, for they, 
too, did nothing, only stood motionless, speechless, staring 
up at the battling giants. 

Loto, with his head buried upon his mother’s shoulder, 
and her arms holding him close, whimpered a little in 


A Combat of Titans 305 

terror. Only Aura, of all the party, did not get upon her 
feet. She lay full length upon the ground, a hand under 
her chin, staring steadily upwards. Her face was expres¬ 
sionless, her eyes unblinking. But her lips moved a little, 
as though she were breathing a silent prayer, and the 
lingers of her hand against her face dug their nails into 
the flesh of her cheek. 

Taller far than the tree-tops, the two giants stood fac¬ 
ing each other. Then the Very Young Man seized one 
of the trees, and with a mighty pull tore it up by the 
roots and swung it through the air. Aura drew a quick 
breath as in another instant they grappled and came crash¬ 
ing to the ground, falling head and shoulders in the river 
with a splash that drenched her with its spray. The Very 
Young Man was underneath, and she seemed to meet the 
glance of his great eyes when he fell. The trees growing 
on the river-bank snapped like rushes beneath the huge 
bodies of the giants, as, still growing larger, they strug¬ 
gled back and forth. The river, stirred into turmoil by 
the sweep of their great arms, rolled its waves up over 
the mossy banks, driving the watchers back into the edge 
of the woods, and even there covering them with its spray. 

A moment more and the giants were on their feet 
again, standing ankle deep, far out in the river. Up 
against the unbroken blackness of the starless sky their 
huge forms towered. For a second they stood motion¬ 
less; then they came together again and Aura could see 
the Very Young Man sink on his knees, his hand trail¬ 
ing in the water. Then in an instant more he struggled 
up to his feet; and as his hand left the water Aura saw 
that it clutched an enormous dripping rock. She held 
her breath, watching the tremendous figures as they 
swayed, locked in each other’s arms. A single step side- 
wise and they were back nearly at the river’s bank; the 
water seethed white under their tread. 


306 The Girl in the Golden At am 

The Very Young Man’s right arm hung limp behind 
him; the boulder in his hand dangled a hundred feet or 
more in the air above the water. Slowly the greater 
strength of his antagonist bent him backwards. Aura’s 
heart stood still as she saw Targo's fingers at the Very 
Young Man’s throat. Then, in a great arc, the Very 
Young Man swept the hand holding the rock over his 
head, and brought it down full upon his enemy’s skull. 
The boulder fell into the river with a thundering splash. 
For a brief instant the giant figures hung swaying; then 
the titanic hulk of Targo’s body came crashing down. It 
fell full across the river, quivered convulsively and lay 
still. 

And the river, backing up before it a moment, turned 
aside in its course, and flung the muddy torrent of its 
water roaring down through the forest. 


CHAPTER XXXVIII 


LOST IN SIZE 

T HE Very Young Man stood ankle deep in the turgid 
little rivulet, a tightness clutching at his chest, and 
with his head whirling. At his feet his antagonist lay 
motionless. He stepped out of the water, putting his 
foot into a tiny grove of trees that bent and crackled like 
twigs under his tread. He wondered if he would faint; 
he knew he must not. Away to the left he saw a line of 
tiny hills; beyond that a luminous obscurity into which 
his sight could not penetrate; behind him there was only 
darkness. He seemed to be standing in the midst of a 
great barren waste, with just a little toy river and forest 
at his feet—a child’s plaything, set down in a man’s great 
desert. 

The Very Young Man suddenly thought of his friends. 
He stepped into the middle of the river and out again on 
the other side. Then he bent down with his face close 
to the ground, just above the tops of the tiny little trees. 
He made the human figures out finally. Hardly larger 
than ants they seemed, and he shuddered as he saw them. 
The end of his thumb could have smashed them all, they 
were so small. 

One of the figures seemed to be waving something, 
and the Very Young Man thought he heard the squeak 
of its voice. He straightened upright, standing rigid, 
afraid to move his feet. He wondered what he should 
do, and in sudden fear felt for the vial of the diminish¬ 
ing drug. It was still in place, in the pouch under his 
armpit. The Very Young Man breathed a sigh of relief. 

307 


308 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

He decided to take the drug and rejoin his friends. Then 
as a sudden thought struck him he bent down to the 
ground again, slowly, with infinite caution. The little 
figures were still there; and now he thought they were 
not quite as tiny as before. He watched them ; slowly 
but unmistakably they were growing larger. 

The Very Young Man carefully took a step backwards, 
and then sat down heavily. The forest trees crackled 
under him. He pulled up his knees, and rested his head 
upon them. The little rivulet diverted from its course 
by the body of Targo, swept past through the woods al¬ 
most at his side. The noise it made mingled with the 
ringing in his head. His body ached all over; he closed 
his eyes. 

“He’s all right now,” the Doctor’s voice said. “He’ll 
be all right in a moment.” 

The Very Young Man opened his eyes. He was lying 
upon the ground, with Aura sitting beside him, and his 
friends—all his own size again—standing over him. 

He met Aura’s tender, serious eyes, and smiled. “I’m 
all right,” he said. “What a foolish thing to faint.” 

Lylda stooped beside him. “You saved us all,” she 
said. “There is nothing we can say—to mean what it 
should. But you will always know how we feel; how 
splendid you were.” 

To the praise they gave him the Very Young Man had 
no answer save a smile of embarrassment. Aura said 
nothing, only met his smile with one of her own, and with 
a tender glance that made his heart beat faster. 

“I’m all right,” he repeated after a moment of silence. 
“Let’s get started.” 

They sat down now beside the Very Young Man, and 
earnestly discussed the best plan for getting out of the 
ring. 


Lost in Size 


309 

You said you had calculated the best way,” suggested 
the Doctor to the Chemist.” 

First of all,” interrupted the Big Business Man. “Are 
we sure none of these Oriods is going to follow us? 
For Heaven's sake let's have done with these terrible 
struggles.” 

The Very Young Man remembered. “He stole one of 
the vials,” he said, pointing to Targo's body. 

“He was probably alone,” the Chemist reasoned. “If 
any others had been with him they would have taken 
some of the drug also. Probably Targo took one of the 
pills and then dropped the vial to the ground.” 

“My idea,” pursued the Big Business Man, “is for us 
to get large just as quickly and continuously as possible. 
Probably you’re right about Targo, but don’t let’s take 
any chances. 

“I’ve been thinking,” he continued, seeing that they 
agreed with him. “You know this is a curious problem 
we have facing us. I've been thinking about it a lot. 
It seemed a frightful long trip down here, but in spite of 
that, I can't get it out of my mind that we’re only a very 
little distance under the surface of the ring.” 

“It’s absolutely all in the viewpoint,” the Chemist said 
with a smile. “That's what I meant about having an 
easier method of getting out. The distance depends 
absolutely on how you view it.” 

“How far would it be out if we didn’t get any larger?” 
the Very Young Man wanted to know. 

“Based on the size of a normal Oroid adult, and using 
the terrestrial standard of feet and inches as they would 
seem to us when Oroid size, I should say the distance 
from Arite to the surface of the ring would be about 
one hundred and fifty to a hundred and sixty thousand 
miles.” 

“Holy mackerel!” exclaimed the Very Young Man. 


310 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

“Don’t let’s do much walking while we’re small/’ 

“You have the idea exactly/’ smiled the Chemist. 

“Taking the other viewpoint,’’ said the Doctor. “Just 
where do you figure this Oroid universe is located in the 
ring?” 

“It is contained within one of the atoms of gold,” the 
Chemist answered. “And that golden atom, I estimate, 
is located probably within one one-hundredth of an inch, 
possibly even one one-thousandth of an inch away from 
the circular indentation I made in the bottom of the 
scratch. In actual distance I suppose Arite is possibly 
one-sixteenth of an inch below the surface of the 
ring.” 

“Certainly makes a difference how you look at it,” mur¬ 
mured the Very Young Man in awe. 

The Chemist went on. “It is obvious then, that al¬ 
though when coming down the distance must be covered 
to some extent by physical movement—by traveling geo¬ 
graphically, so to speak—going back, that is not altogether 
the case. Most of the distance may be covered by bodily 
growth, rather than by a movement of the body from 
place to place.” 

“We might get lost,” objected the Very Young Man. 
“Suppose we got started in the wrong direction?” 

“Coming in, that is a grave danger,” answered the 
Chemist, “because then distances are opening up and a 
single false step means many miles of error later on. But 
going out, just the reverse is true; distances are shorten¬ 
ing. A mile in the wrong direction is corrected in an 
instant later on. Not coming to a realization of that 
when I made the trip before, led me to undertake many 
unnecessary hours of most arduous climbing. There is 
only one condition imperative; the body growing must 
have free space for its growth, or it will be crushed to 
death.” 


Lost in Size 


311 

“Have you planned exactly how we are to get out?” 
asked the Big Business Man. 

“Yes, I have,” the Chemist answered. “In the size we 
are now, which you must remember is several thousand 
times Oroid height, it will be only a short distance to a 
point where as we grow we can move gradually to the 
centre of the circular pit. That huge inclined plane 
slides down out of it, you remember. Once in the pit, 
with its walls closing in upon us, we can at the proper 
moment get out of it about as I did before.” 

“Then we’ll be in the valley of the scratch,” exclaimed 
the Very Young Man eagerly. “Til certainly be glad to 
get back there again.” 

“Getting out of the valley we’ll use the same methods,” 
the Chemist continued. “There we shall have to do 
some climbing, but not nearly so much as I did.” 

The Very Young Man was thrilled at the prospect of 
so speedy a return to his own world. “Let’s get going,” 
he suggested quickly. “It sounds a cinch.” 

They started away in a few minutes more, leaving the 
body of Targo lying where it had fallen across the river. 
In half an hour of walking they located without difficulty 
the huge incline down which the Chemist had fallen when 
first he came into the ring. Following along the bottom 
of the incline they reached his landing place—a mass of 
small rocks and pebbles of a different metallic-looking 
stone than the ground around marking it plainly. These 
were the rocks and boulders that had been brought down 
with him in his fall. 

“From here,” said the Chemist, as they came to a halt, 
“we can go up into the valley by growth alone. It is 
several hours, but we need move very little from this 
position.” 

“How about eating?” suggested the Very Young Man. 

They sat down at the base of the incline and ate an- 


312 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

other meal—rather a more lavish one this time, for the 
rest they had taken, and the prospect of a shorter journey 
ahead of them than they had anticipated made the Doctor 
less strict. Then, the meal over, they took the amount of 
the drug the Chemist specified. He measured it care¬ 
fully—more than ten of the pills. 

“We have a long wait,” the Chemist said, when the 
first sickness from this tremendous dose had left them. 

The time passed quickly. They spoke seldom, for the 
extraordinary rapidity with which the aspect of the land¬ 
scape was changing, and the remarkable sensations they 
experienced, absorbed all their attention. 

In about two hours after taking the drug the curving, 
luminous line that was the upper edge of the incline came 
into view, faint and blurred, but still distinct against the 
blackness of the sky. The incline now was noticeably 
steeper; each moment they saw its top coming down to¬ 
wards them out of the heights above, and its surface 
smoothing out and becoming more nearly perpendicular. 

They were all standing up now. The ground beneath 
them seemed in rapid motion, coming towards them from 
all directions, and dwindling away beneath their feet. 
The incline too—now in form a vertical concave wall— 
kept shoving itself forward, and they had to step back¬ 
wards continually to avoid its thrust. 

Within another hour a similar concave wall appeared 
behind them which they could follow with their eyes en¬ 
tirely around the circumference of the great pit in which 
they now found themselves. The sides of this pit soon 
became completely perpendicular—smooth and shining. 

Another hour and the action of the drug was beginning 
to slacken—the walls encircling them, although steadily 
closing in, no longer seemed to move with such rapidity. 
The pit as they saw it now was perhaps a thousand feet 
in diameter and twice as deep. Far overhead the black- 


Lost in Size 


313 

ness of the sky was beginning to be tinged with a faint 
gray-blue. 

At the Chemist’s suggestion they walked over near the 
center of the circular enclosure. Slowly its walls closed 
in about them. An hour more and its diameter was 
scarcely fifty feet. 

The Chemist called his companions around him. 

“There is an obstacle here,” he began, “that we can 
easily overcome; but we must all understand just what 
we are to do. In perhaps half an hour at the rate we 
are growing this enclosure will resemble a well twice as 
deep, approximately, as it is broad. We cannot climb 
up its sides, therefore we must wait until it is not more 
than six feet in depth in order to be able to get out. At 
that time its diameter will be scarcely three feet. There 
are nine of us here; you can realize there would not be 
room for us all. 

“What we must do is very simple. Since there is 
not room for us all at once, we must get large from now 
on only one at a time.” 

“Quite so,” said the Big Business Man in a perfectly 
matter-of-fact tone. 

“All of us but one will stop growing now; one will go 
on and get out of the pit. He will immediately stop his 
growth so that he can wait for the others and help them 
out. Each of us will follow the same method of pro¬ 
cedure.” 

The Chemist then went on to arrange the exact quan¬ 
tities of the drugs they were each to take at specified 
times, so that at the end they would all be nearly the 
same size again. When he had explained all this to Oteo 
and Eena in their native language, they were ready to 
proceed with the plan. 

“Who’s first?” asked the Very Young Man. “Let me 
go with Loto.” 


314 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

They selected the Chemist to go first, and all but him 
took a little of the other drug and checked their growth. 
The pit at this time was hardly more than fifteen feet 
across and about thirty feet deep. 

The Chemist stood in the centre of the enclosure, while 
his friends crowded over against its walls to make room 
for his growing body. It was nearly half an hour before 
his head was above its top. He waited only a moment 
more, then he sprang upwards, clambered out of the pit 
and disappeared beyond the rim. In a few moments they 
saw his huge head and shoulders hanging out over the 
side wall; his hand and arm reached down towards them 
and they heard his great voice roaring. 

“Come on—somebody else.” 

The Very Young Man went next, with Loto. Noth¬ 
ing unusual marked their growth, and without difficulty, 
helped by the Chemist’s hands reaching down to them, 
they climbed out of the pit. 

In an hour more the entire party was in the valley, 
standing beside the little circular opening out of which 
they had come. 

The Very Young Man found himself beside Aura, a* 
little apart from the others, who gathered to discuss their 
plan for growing out of the valley. 

“It isn't much of a trip, is it, Aura?” the Very Young 
Man said. “Do you realize, we’re nearly there?” 

The girl looked around her curiously. The valley of 
the scratch appeared to them now hardly more than a 
quarter of a mile in width. Aura stared upwards be¬ 
tween its narrow walls to where, several thousand feet 
above, a narrow strip of gray-blue sky was visible. 

“That sky—is that the sky of your world?” she ex¬ 
claimed. “How pretty it is!” 

The Very Young Man laughed. 

“No, Aura, that’s not our sky. It’s only the space in 


Lost in Size 


315 

the room above the ring. When we get the size we are 
going to be finally, our heads will be right up in there. 
The real sky with its stars will be even then as far above 
us as your sky at Arite was above you.” 

Aura breathed a long sigh. “It's too wonderful— 
really to understand, isn’t it?” she said. 

The Very Young Man pulled her down on the ground 
beside him. 

“The most wonderful part, Aura, is going to be having 
you up there.” He spoke gently; somehow whenever he 
thought of this fragile little girl-woman up in his strange 
bustling world, he felt himself very big and strong. He 
wanted to be her protector, and her teacher of all the new 
and curious things she must learn. 

The girl did not reply at once; she simply met his 
earnest gaze with her frank answering smile of under¬ 
standing. 

The Chemist was calling to them. 

“Oh, you Jack. We’re about ready to start.” 

The Very Young Man got to his feet, holding down his 
hands to help Aura up. 

“You’re going to make a fine woman, Aura, in this 
new world. You just wait and see if you don’t,” he said 
as they rejoined the others. 

The Chemist explained his plans to them. “This valley 
is several times deeper than its breadth; you can see that. 
We cannot grow large enough to jump out as we did out 
of the pit; we would be crushed by the walls before we 
were sufficiently tall to leap out. 

“But we’re not going to do as I did, and climb all the 
way up. Instead we will stay here at the bottom until 
we are as large as we can conveniently get between the 
valley walls. Then we will stop growing and climb up 
the side; it will only be a short distance then.” 

The Very Young Man nodded his comprehension. 


316 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

“Unless by that time the walls are too smooth to climb 
up,” he remarked. 

“If we see them getting too smooth, we’ll stop and be¬ 
gin climbing,” the Chemist agreed. “We’re all ready, 
aren’t we?” He began measuring out the estimated 
quantities of the drug, handing it to each of them. 

“Say, I’m terrible sorry,” began the Very Young Man, 
apologetically interrupting this procedure. “But you 
know if it wasn’t for me, we’d all starve to death.” 

It was several hours since they had eaten last, and all 
of them were hungry, although the excitement of their 
strange journey had kept them from realizing it. They 
ate—“the last meal in the ring” as the Big Business Man 
put it—and in half an hour more they were ready to start. 

When they had reached a size where it seemed desi¬ 
rable again to stop growing the valley resembled a nar¬ 
row canon—hardly more than a deep rift in the ground. 
They were still standing on its floor; above them, the 
parallel edges of the rift marked the surface of the ring. 
The side walls of the canon were smooth, but there 
were still many places where they could climb out with¬ 
out much difficulty. 

They started up a narrow declivity along the canon 
face. The Chemist led the way; the Very Young Man, 
with Aura just in front of him, was last. They had been 
walking only a moment when the Chemist called back 
over his shoulder. 

“It’s getting very narrow. We’d better stop here and 
take the drug.” 

The Chemist had reached a rocky shelf—a ledge some 
twenty feet square that jutted out from the canon wall. 
They gathered upon it, and took enough of the diminish¬ 
ing drug to stop their growth. Then the Chemist again 
started forward; but, very soon after, a cry of alarm 
from Aura stopped him. 


Lost in Size 


317 

The party turned in confusion and crowded back. 
Aura, pale and trembling, was standing on the very brink 
of the ledge looking down. The Very Young Man had 
disappeared. 

The Big Business Man ran to the brink. “Did he fall? 
Where is he? I don’t see him.” 

They gathered in confusion about the girl. “No,” she 
said. “He—just a moment ago he was here.” 

“He couldn’t have fallen,” the Doctor exclaimed. “It 
isn’t far down there—we’d see him.” 

The truth suddenly dawned on the Doctor. “Don’t 
move!” he commanded sharply. “Don’t any of you 
move! Don’t take a step!” 

Uncomprehending, they stood motionless. The Doc¬ 
tor’s gaze was at the rocky floor under his feet. 

“It’s size,” he added vehemently. “Don’t you under¬ 
stand? He’s taken too much of the diminishing drug.” 

An exclamation from Oteo made them all move to¬ 
wards him, in spite of the Doctor’s command. There, 
close by Oteo’s feet, they saw the tiny figure of the Very 
Young Man, already no more than an inch in height, and 
rapidly growing smaller. 

The Doctor bent down, and the little figure waved its 
arms in terror. 

“Don’t get smaller,” called the Doctor. But even as 
he said it, he realized it was a futile command. 

The Very Young Man answered, in a voice so minute 
it seemed coming from an infinite distance. 

“I can’t stop! I haven’t any of the other drug!” 

They all remembered then. Targo had stolen the Very 
Young Man’s vial of the enlarging drug. It had never 
been replaced. Instead the Very Young Man had been 
borrowing from the others as he went along. 

The Big Business Man was seized with sudden panic. 

“He’ll get lost. We must get smaller with him.” He 


318 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

turned sidewise, and stumbling over a rock almost crushed 
the Very Young Man with the step he took to recover 
his balance. 

Aura, with a cry, pushed several of the others back; 
Oteo and Eena, frightened, started down the declivity. 

“We must get smaller!” the Big Business Man reiter¬ 
ated. 

The panic was growing among them all. Above their 
excited cries the Doctor’s voice rose. 

“Stand still—all of you. If we move—even a few 
steps—we can never get small and hope to find him.” 

The Doctor—himself too confused to know whether he 
should take the diminishing drug at once or not—was 
bending over the ground. And as he watched, fascinated, 
the Very Young Man’s figure dwindled beyond the van¬ 
ishing point and was gone! 



CHAPTER XXXIX 


A MODERN DINOSAUR 

T HE Very Young Man never knew quite how it hap¬ 
pened. The Doctor had told them to check their 
growth: and he took the drug abstractedly, for his mind 
was on Aura and how she would feel, coming for the 
first time into this great outer world. 

What quantity he took, the Very Young Man after¬ 
ward could never decide. But the next thing he knew, 
the figures of his companions had grown to gigantic size. 
The rocks about him were expanding enormously. Al¬ 
ready he had lost the contour of the ledge. The canon 
wall had drawn back almost out of sight in the haze of the 
distance. He turned around, bewildered. There was no 
precipice behind him. Instead, a great, rocky plain, 
tumbling with a mass of boulders, and broken by seams 
and rifts, spread out to his gaze. And even in that in¬ 
stant, as he regarded it in confusion, it opened up to 
greater distances. 

Near at hand—a hundred yards away, perhaps—a gi¬ 
gantic human figure towered five hundred feet into the 
air. Around it, further away, others equally large, were 
blurred into the haze of distance. 

The nearer figure stooped, and the Very Young Man, 
fearful that he might be crushed by its movement, waved 
his arms in terror. He started to run, leaping over the 
jagged ground beneath his feet. A great roaring voice 
from above came down to him—the Doctor’s voice. 
“Don’t get smaller!’’ 


319 


320 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

The Very Young Man stopped running, more fright¬ 
ened than ever before with the realization that came to 
him. He shouted upward: 

“I can’t stop! I haven’t any of the other drug!” 

An enormous blurred object came swooping towards 
him, and went past with a rush of wind—the foot of the 
Big Business Man, though the Very Young Man did not 
know it. Above him now the air was filled with roaring 
—the excited voices of his friends. 

A few moments passed while the Very Young Man 
stood stock still, too frightened to move. The roaring 
above gradually ceased. The towering figures expanded 
—faded back into the distance—disappeared. 

The Very Young Man was alone in the silence and des¬ 
olation of a jagged, broken landscape that was still ex¬ 
panding beneath him. For some time he stood there, be¬ 
wildered. He came to himself suddenly with the thought 
that although he was too small to be seen by his friends, 
yet they must be there still within a few steps of him. 
They might take a step—might crush him to death with¬ 
out seeing him, or knowing that they had done it! There 
were rocky buttes and hills all about him now. Without 
stopping to reason what he was doing he began to run. 
He did not know or care where—anywhere away from 
those colossal figures who with a single step would crush 
the very hills and rocks about him and bury him beneath 
an avalanche of golden quartz. 

He ran, in panic, for an hour perhaps, scrambling over 
little ravines, falling into a crevice—climbing out and 
running again. At last, with his feet torn and bleeding, 
he threw himself to the ground, utterly exhausted. 

After a time, with returning strength, the Very Young 
Man began to think more calmly. He was lost—lost in 
size—the one thing that the Doctor, when they started 
down into the ring, had warned them against so earnestly. 


A Modern Dinosaur 321 

What a fool he had been to run! He was miles away 
from them now. He could not make himself large; and 
were they to get smaller—small enough to see him, they 
might wander in this barren wilderness for days and never 
chance to come upon him. 

The Very Young Man cursed himself for a fool. 
Why hadn’t he kept some of the enlarging drug with 
him ? And then abruptly, he realized something addition¬ 
ally terrifying. The dose of the diminishing drug which 
he had just taken so thoughtlessly, was the last that re¬ 
mained in that vial. He was utterly helpless. Thou¬ 
sands of miles of rocky country surrounded him—a 
wilderness devoid of vegetation, of water, and of life. 

Lying prone upon the ground, which at last had 
stopped expanding, the Very Young Man gave himself 
up to terrified reflection. So this was the end—all the 
dangers they had passed through—their conquests—and 
the journey out of the ring so near to a safe end¬ 
ing. . . . And then this! 

For a time the Very Young Man abandoned hope. 
There was nothing to do, of course. They could never 
find him—probably, with women and a child among them 
they would not dare even to try. They would go 
safely back to their own world—but he—Jack Bruce— 
would remain in the ring. He laughed with bitter cyni¬ 
cism at the thought. Even the habitable world of the 
ring itself, was denied him. Like a lost soul, poised be¬ 
tween two worlds, he was abandoned, waiting helpless, 
until hunger and thirst would put an end to his suffer¬ 
ings. 

Then the Very Young Man thought of Aura; and with 
the thought came a new determination not to give up 
hope. He stood up and looked about him, steeling him¬ 
self against the flood of despair that again was almost 
overwhelming. He must return as nearly as possible to 


322 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

the point where he had parted from his friends. It was 
the only chance he had remaining—to be close enough so 
if one, or all of them, had become small, they would be 
able to see him. 

There was little to choose of direction in the desolate 
waste around, but dimly the Very Young Man recalled 
having a low line of hills behind him when he was run¬ 
ning. He faced that way now. He had come perhaps 
six or seven miles; he would return now as nearly as 
possible over the same route. He selected a gully that 
seemed to wind in that general direction, and climbing 
down into it, started off along its floor. 

The gully was some forty feet deep and seemed to 
average considerably wider. Its sides were smooth and 
precipitous in some places; in others they were broken. 
The Very Young Man had been walking some thirty min¬ 
utes when, as he came abruptly around a sharp bend, he 
saw before him the most terrifying object he had ever 
beheld. He stood stock still, fascinated with horror. 
On the floor of the gully, directly in front of him, lay a 
gigantic lizard—a reptile hideous, grotesque in its enor¬ 
mity. It was lying motionless, with its jaw, longer than 
his own body, flat on the ground as though it were sun¬ 
ning itself. Its tail, motionless also, wound out behind 
it. It was a reptile that by its size—it seemed to the 
Very Young Man at least thirty feet long—might have 
been a dinosaur reincarnated out of the dark, mysterious 
ages of the earth’s formation. And yet, even in that 
moment of horror, the Very Young Man recognized it 
for what it was—the tiny lizard the Chemist had sent 
into the valley of the scratch to test his drug! 

At sight of the Very Young Man the reptile raised its 
great head. Its tongue licked out hideously; its huge 
eyes stared unblinking. And then, slowly, hastelessly, it 


A Modern Dinosaur 323 

began coming forward, its great feet scratching on the 
rocks, its tail sliding around a boulder behind it. 

The \ ery Y oung Man waited no longer, but turning, 
ran back headlong the way he had come. Curiously 
enough, this new danger, though it terrified, did not con¬ 
fuse him. It was a situation demanding physical action, 
and with it he found his mind working clearly. He 
leaped over a rock, half stumbled, recovered himself and 
dashed onward. 

A glance over his shoulder showed him the reptile com¬ 
ing around the bend in the gully. It slid forward, 
crawling over the rocks without effort, still hastelessly, as 
though leisurely to pick up this prey which it knew could 
not escape it. 

The gully here chanced to have smooth, almost perpen¬ 
dicular sides. The Very Young Man saw that he could 
not climb out; and even if he could, he knew that the 
reptile would go up the sides as easily as along the floor. 
It had been over a hundred feet from him when he first 
saw it. Now it was less than half that distance and 
gaining rapidly. 

For an instant the Very Young Man slackened his 
flight. To run on would be futile. The reptile would 
overtake him any moment; even now he knew that with a 
sudden spring it could land upon him. 

A cross rift at right angles in the wall came into sight— 
a break in the rock as though it had been riven apart by 
some gigantic wedge. It was as deep as the gully itself 
and just wide enough to admit the passage of the Very 
Young Man’s body. He darted into it; and heard be¬ 
hind him the spring of the reptile as it landed at the en¬ 
trance to the rift into which its huge size barred it from 
advancing. 

The Very Young Man stopped—panting for breath. 


324 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

He could just turn about between the enclosing walls. 
Behind him, outside in the gully, the lizard lay baffled. 
And then, seemingly without further interest, it moved 
away. 

The Very Young Man rested. The danger was past. 
He could get out of the rift, doubtless, further ahead, 
without reentering the gully. And, if he kept well away 
from the reptile, probably it would not bother him. 

Exultation filled the Very Young Man. And then 
again he remembered his situation—lost in size, helpless, 
without the power to rejoin his friends. He had escaped 
death in one form only to confront it again in another— 
worse perhaps, since it was the more lingering. 

Ahead of him, the rift seemed ascending and opening 
up. He followed it, and in a few hundred yards was 
again on the broken plateau above, level now with the top- 
of the gully. 

The winding gully itself, the Very Young Man could 
see plainly. Its nearest point to him was some six hun¬ 
dred feet away; and in its bottom he knew that hideous 
reptile lurked. He shuddered and turned away, instinc¬ 
tively walking quietly, fearing to make some noise that 
might again attract its attention to him. 

And then came a sound that drove the blood from his 
face and turned him cold all over. From the depths of 
the gully, in another of its bends nearby, the sound of an 
anxious girl’s voice floated upward. 

“Jack! Oh Jack!” And again: 

“Jack—my friend Jack!” 

It was Aura, his own size perhaps, in the gully search¬ 
ing for him! 

With frantic, horrified haste, the Very Young Man ran 
towards the top of the gully. He shouted warningly, as 
he ran. 

Aura must have heard him, for her voice changed from 


A Modern Dinosaur 325 

anxiety to a glad cry of relief. He reached the top of 
the gully; at its bottom—forty feet below down its pre¬ 
cipitous side—stood Aura, looking up, radiant, to greet 
him. 

“I took the drug,” she cried. “I took it before they 
could forbid me. They are waiting—up there for us. 
There is no danger now, Jack.” 

The Very Young Man tried to silence her. A noise 
down the gully made him turn. The gigantic reptile ap¬ 
peared around the nearby bend. It saw the girl and 
scuttled forward, rattling the loose bowlders beneath its 
feet as it came. 

Aura saw it the same instant. She looked up helplessly 
to the Very Young Man above her; then she turned and 
ran down the gully. 

The Very Young Man stood transfixed. It was a 
sheer drop of forty feet or more to the gully floor be¬ 
neath him. There was seemingly nothing that he could 
do in those few terrible seconds, and yet with subcon¬ 
scious, instinctive reasoning, he did the one and only 
thing possible. A loose mass of the jagged, gold quartz 
hung over the gully wall. Frantically he tore at it— 
pried loose with feet and hands a bowlder that hung 
poised. As the lizard approached, the loosened rock slid 
forward, and dropped squarely upon the reptile’s broad 
back. 

It was a bowlder nearly as large as the Very Young 
Man himself, but the gigantic reptile shook it off, writh¬ 
ing and twisting for an instant, and hurling the smaller 
loose rocks about the floor of the gully with its struggles. 

The Very Young Man cast about for another missile, 
but there were none at hand. Aura, at the confusion, 
had stopped about two hundred feet away. 

'‘Run!” shouted the Very Young Man. “Hide some¬ 
where ! Run!” 


326 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

The lizard, momentarily stunned, recovered swiftly. 
Again it started forward, seemingly now as alert as be¬ 
fore. And then, without warning, in the air above his 
head the Very Young Man heard the rush of gigantic 
wings. A tremendous grey body swooped past him and 
into the gully—a bird larger in proportion than the lizard 
itself. ... It was the little sparrow the Chemist had 
sent in from the outside world—maddened now by thirst 
and hunger, which to the reptile had been much more en¬ 
durable. 

The Very Young Man, shouting again to Aura to run, 
stood awe-struck, watching the titanic struggle that was 
raging below him. The great lizard rose high on its fore¬ 
legs to meet this enemy. Its tremendous jaws opened— 
and snapped closed; but the bird avoided them. Its huge 
claws gripped the reptile’s back; its flapping wings spread 
the sixty foot width of the gully as it strove to raise its 
prey into the air. The roaring of these enormous wings 
was deafening; the wind from them as they came up tore 
past the Very Young Man in violent gusts; and as they 
went down, the suction of air almost swept him over the 
brink of the precipice. He flung himself prone, clinging 
desperately to hold his position. 

The lizard threshed and squirmed. A swish of its 
enormous tail struck the gully wall and brought down an 
avalanche of loose, golden rock. But the giant bird held 
its grip; its bill—so large that the Very Young Man’s 
body could easily have lain within it—pecked ferociously 
at the lizard’s head. 

It was a struggle to the death—an unequal struggle, 
though it raged for many minutes with an uncanny fury. 
At last, dragging its adversary to where the gully was 
wider, the bird flapped its wings with freedom of move¬ 
ment and laboriously rose into the air. 

And a moment later the Very Young Man, looking up- 


A Modern Dinosaur 


3^7 

ward, saw through the magic diminishing glass of dis¬ 
tance, a little sparrow of his own world, with a tiny, help¬ 
less lizard struggling in its grasp. 

“Aura! Don’t cry, Aura! Gosh, I don’t want you to 
cry—everything’s all right now.” 

The Very Young Man sat awkwardly beside the 
frightened girl, who, overcome by the strain of what she 
had been through, was crying silently. It was strange 
to see Aura crying; she had always been such a Spartan, 
so different from any other girl he had ever known. It 
confused him. 

“Don’t cry, Aura,” he repeated. He tried clumsily to 
soothe her. He wanted to thank her for what she had 
done in risking her life to find him. He wanted to tell 
her a thousand tender things that sprang into his heart as 
he sat there beside her. But when she raised her tear- 
stained face and smiled at him bravely, all he said was: 

“Gosh, that was some fight, wasn’t it? It was great of 
you to come down after me, Aura. Are they waiting for 
us up there?” And then when she nodded: 

“We’d better hurry, Aura. How can we ever find 
them ? We must have come miles from where they are.” 

She smiled at him quizzically through her tears. 

“You forget, Jack, how small we are. They are wait¬ 
ing on the little ledge for us—and all this country—” 
She spread her arms toward the vast wilderness that sur¬ 
rounded them—“this is all only a very small part of that 
same ledge on which they are standing.” 

It was true; and the Very Young Man realized it at 
once. 

Aura had both drugs with her. They took the one to 
increase their size, and without mishap or moving from 
where they were, rejoined those on the little ledge who 
were so anxiously awaiting them. 


328 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

For half an hour the Very Young Man recounted his 
adventure, with praises of Aura that made the girl run to 
her sister to hide her confusion. Then once more the 
party started its short climb out of the valley of the 
scratch. In ten minutes they were all safely on the top— 
on the surface of the ring at last. 







CHAPTER XL 

THE ADVENTURERS’ RETURN 

T HE Banker, lying huddled in his chair in the club- 
room, awoke with a start. The ring lay at his 
feet—a shining, golden band gleaming brightly in the 
light as it lay upon the black silk handkerchief. The 
Banker shivered a little for the room was cold. Then he 
realized he had been asleep and looked at his watch. 
Three o’clock! They had been gone seven hours, and he 
had not taken the ring back to the Museum as they had 
told him to. He rose hastily to his feet; then as another 
thought struck him, he sat down again, staring at the 
ring. 

The honk of an automobile horn in the street outside 
aroused him from his reverie. He got to his feet and 
mechanically began straightening up the room, packing up 
the several suit-cases. Then with obvious awe, and a 
caution that was almost ludicrous, he fixed the ring in its 
frame within the valise prepared for it. He lighted the 
little light in the valise, and, every moment or two, went 
back to look searchingly down at the ring inside. 

When everything was packed the Banker left the room, \ 
returning in a moment with two of the club attendants. 
They carried the suit-cases outside, the Banker himself 
gingerly holding the bag containing the ring. 

“A taxi,” he ordered when they were at the door. 
Then he went to the desk, explaining that his friends had 
left earlier in the evening and that they had finished with 
the room. 


329 


330 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

To the taxi-driver he gave a number that was not the 
Museum address, but that of his own bachelor apartment 
on Park Avenue. It was still raining as he got into the 
taxi; he held the valise tightly on his lap, looking into it 
occasionally and gruffly ordering the chauffeur to drive 
slowly. 

In the sumptuous living-room of his apartment he 
spread the handkerchief on the floor under the center 
electrolier and laid the ring upon it. Dismissing the 
astonished and only half-awake butler with a growl, he sat 
down in an easy-chair facing the ring, and in a few min¬ 
utes more was again fast asleep. 

In the morning when the maid entered he was still sleep¬ 
ing. Two hours later he rang for her, and gave tersely a 
variety of orders. These she and the butler obeyed with 
an air that plainly showed they thought their master had 
taken leave of his senses. 

They brought him his breakfast and a bath-robe and 
slippers. And the butler carried in a mattress and a pair 
of blankets, laying them with a sigh on the hardwood 
floor in a corner of the room. 

Then the Banker waved them away. He undressed, 
put on his bath-robe and slippers and sat down calmly to 
eat his breakfast. When he had finished he lighted a 
cigar and sat again in his easy-chair, staring at the ring, 
engrossed with his thoughts. Three days he would give 
them. Three days, to be sure they had made the trip suc¬ 
cessfully. Then he would take the ring to the Museum. 
And every Sunday he would visit it; until they came back 
—if they ever did. 

I 

The Banker’s living-room with its usually perfect ap¬ 
pointments was in thorough disorder. His meals were 
still being served him there by his dismayed servants. 
The mattress still lay in the corner; on it the rumpled 


The Adventurers’ Return 331 

blankets showed where he had been sleeping. For the 
hundredth time during his long vigil the Banker, still 
wearing his dressing-gown and slippers and needing a 
shave badly, put his face down close to the ring. His 
heart leaped into his throat; his breath came fast; for 
along the edge of the ring a tiny little line of figures was 
slowly moving. 

He looked closer, careful lest his laboured breathing 
blow them away. He saw they were human forms— 
little upright figures, an eighth of an inch or less in height 
•—moving slowly along one behind the other. He counted 
nine of them. Nine! he thought, with a shock of sur¬ 
prise. Why, only three had gone in! Then they had 
found Rogers, and were bringing him and others back 
with him! 

Relief from the strain of many hours surged over the 
Banker. His eyes filled with tears; he dashed them away 
—and thought how ridiculous a feeling it was that pos¬ 
sessed him. Then suddenly his head felt queer; he was 
afraid he was going to faint. He rose unsteadily to his 
feet, and threw himself full-length upon the mattress in 
the corner of the room. Then his senses faded. He 
seemed hardly to faint, but rather to drift off into an in¬ 
voluntary but pleasant slumber. 

With returning consciousness the Banker heard in the 
room a confusion of many voices. He opened his eyes; 
the Doctor was sitting on the mattress beside him. The 
Banker smiled and parted his lips to speak, but the Doctor 
interrupted him. 

“Well, old friend!” he cried heartily. “What hap¬ 
pened to you? Here we are back all safely.” 

The Banker shook his friend’s hand with emotion; then 
after a moment he sat up and iooked about him. The 
room seemed full of people—strange looking figures, in 


332 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

extraordinary costumes, dirty and torn. The Very 
Young Man crowded forward. 

“We got back, sir, didn’t we?” he said. 

The Banker saw he was holding a young girl by the 
hand—the most remarkable-looking girl, the Banker 
thought, that he had ever beheld. Her single garment, 
hanging short of her bare knees, was ragged and dirty; 
her jet black hair fell in tangled masses over her shoul¬ 
ders. 

“This is Aura,” said the Very Young Man. His voice 
was full of pride; his manner ingenuous as a child’s. 

Without a trace of embarrassment the girl smiled and 
with a pretty little bending of her head, held down her 
hand to the astonished Banker, who sat speechless upon 
his mattress. 

Loto pushed forward. “That’s mamita over there,” he 
said, pointing. “Her name is Lylda; she’s Aura’s sister.” 

The Banker recovered his wits. “Well, and who are 
you, little man?” he asked with a smile. 

“My name is Loto,” the little boy answered earnestly. 
“That’s my father.” And he pointed across the room to 
where the Chemist was coming forward to join them. 




CHAPTER XU 

THE FIRST CHRISTMAS 

C HRISTMAS EVE in a little village of Northern 
New York—a white Christmas, clear and cold. In 
the dark, blue-black of the sky the glittering stars were 
spread thick; the brilliant moon poured down its silver 
light over the whiteness of the sloping roof-tops, and upon 
the ghostly white, silently drooping trees. A heaviness 
hung in the frosty air—a stillness broken only by the 
tinkling of sleigh-bells or sometimes by the merry laugh¬ 
ter of the passers-by. 

At the outskirts of the village, a little back from the 
road, a farmhouse lay snuggled up between two huge 
apple-trees—an old-fashioned, rambling farmhouse with 
a steeply pitched roof, piled high now, with snow. It 
was brilliantly lighted this Christmas Eve, its lower win¬ 
dows sending forth broad yellow beams of light over the 
whiteness of the ground outside. 

In one of the lower rooms of the house, before a huge, 
blazing log-fire, a woman and four men sat talking. 
Across the room, at a table, a little boy was looking at a 
picture-book by the light of an oil-lamp. 

The woman made a striking picture as she sat back at 
ease before the fire. She was dressed in a simple black 
evening-dress such as a lady of the city would wear. It 
covered her shoulders, but left her throat bare. Her 
features, particularly her eyes, had a slight Oriental cast, 
which the mass of very black hair coiled on her head ac¬ 
centuated. Yet she did not look like an Oriental, nor in- 

333 


334 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

deed like a woman of any race of this earth. Her cheeks 
were red—the delicate diffused red of perfect health. 
But underneath the red there lay a curious mixture of 
other colours, not only on her cheeks but particularly 
noticeable on her neck and arms. Her skin was smooth 
as a pearl; in the mellow firelight it glowed, with the 
iridescence of a shell. 

The four men were dressed in the careless negligee of 
city men in the country. They were talking gaily now 
among themselves. The woman spoke seldom, staring 
dreamily into the fire. 

A clock in another room struck eight; the woman 
glanced over to where the child sat, absorbed with the 
pictures in his book. The page at which he was looking 
showed a sleigh loaded with toys, with a team of rein¬ 
deers and a jolly, fat, white-bearded, red-jacketed old 
man driving the sleigh over the chimney tops. 

“Come Loto, little son,” the woman said. “You hear 
—it is the time of sleep for you.” 

The boy put down his book reluctantly and went over 
to the fireplace, standing beside his mother with an arm 
about her neck. 

“Oh, mamita dear, will he surely come, this Santa 
Claus? He never knew about me before; will he surely 
come ?” 

Lylda kissed him tenderly. “He will come, Loto, 
every Christmas Eve; to you and to all the other children 
of this great world, will he always come.” 

“But you must be asleep when he comes, Loto,” one of 
the men admonished. 

“Yes, my father, that I know,” the boy answered 
gravely. “I will go now.” 

“Come back Loto, when you have undressed,” the 
Chemist called after him, as he left the room. “Remem¬ 
ber you must hang your stocking.” 


335 


The First Christmas 

When they were left alone Lylda looked at her com¬ 
panions and smiled. 

“His first Christmas,” she said.. “How wonderful we 
are going to make it for him.” 

“I can remember so well,” the Big Business Man re¬ 
marked thoughtfully, “when they first told me there was 
no Santa Claus. I cried, for I knew Christmas would 
never be the same to me.” 

“Loto is nearly twelve years old,” the Doctor said. 
“Just imagine—having his first Christmas.” 

“We’re going to make it a corker,” said the Banker. 
“Where’s the tree? We got one.” 

“In the wood-shed,” Lylda answered. “He has not 
seen it; I was so very careful.” 

They were silent a moment. Then: “My room is 
chock full of toys,” the Banker said reflectively. “But 
this is a rotten town for candy canes—they only had little 
ones.” And they all laughed. 

“I have a present for you, Lylda,” the Chemist said 
after a moment. 

“Oh, but you must not give it until to-morrow; you 
yourself have told me that.” 

The Chemist rose. “I want to give it now,” he said, 
and left the room. In a moment he returned, carrying a 
mahogany pedestal under one arm and a square parcel in 
the other. He set the pedestal upright on the floor in a 
corner of the room and began opening the package. It 
was a mahogany case, cubical in shape. He lifted its 
cover, disclosing a glass-bell set upon a flat, mahogany 
slab. Fastened to the center of this was a handsome 
black plush case, in which lay a gold wedding-ring. 

Lylda drew in her breath sharply and held it; the three 
other men stared at the ring in amazement. The Chemist 
was saying: “And I decided not to destroy it, Lylda, 
for your sake. There is no air under this glass cover; 



336 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

the ring is lying in a vacuum, so that nothing can come 
out of it and live. It is quite safe for us to keep it—this 
way. I thought of this plan, afterwards, and decided to 
keep the ring—for you.” He set the glass bell on the 
pedestal. 

Lylda stood before it, bending down close over the 
glass. 

“You give me back—my world,” she breathed; then 
she straightened up, holding out her arms toward the 
ring. “My birthplace—my people—they are safe.” And 
then abruptly she sank to her knees and began softly sob- 
bing. 

Loto called from upstairs and they heard him coming 
down. Lylda went back hastily to the fire; the Chemist 
pushed a large chair in front of the pedestal, hiding it 
from sight. 

The boy, in his night clothes, stood on the hearth be¬ 
side his mother. 

“There is the stocking, mamita. Where shall I hang 
it?” 

“First the prayer, Loto. Can you remember?” 

The child knelt on the hearth, with his head in his 
mother’s lap. 

“Now I lay me-” he began softly, halting over the 

unfamiliar words. Lylda’s fingers stroked his brown 
curly head as it nestled against her knees; the firelight 
shone golden in his tousled curls. 

The Chemist was watching them with moist eyes. 
“His first Christmas,” he murmured, and smiled a little 
tender smile. “His first Christmas.” 

The child was finishing. 

“And God bless Aura, and Jack, and-” 

“And Grandmother Reoh,” his mother prompted softly. 
“And Grandfather Reoh—and mamita, and-” The 





The First Christmas 337 

boy ended with a rush—“and me too. Amen. Now 
where do I hang the stocking, mother ?” 

In a moment the little stocking dangled from a mantel 
over the fireplace. 

You are sure he will come?” the child asked anxiously 
again. 

“It is certain, Loto—if you are asleep.” 

Loto kissed his mother and shook hands solemnly with 
the men—a grave, dignified little figure. 

“Good night, Loto,” said the Big Business Man. 

“Good night, sir. Good night, my father—good night, 
mamita; I shall be asleep very soon.” And with a last 
look at the stocking he ran out of the room. 

“What a Christmas he will have,” said the Banker, a 
little huskily. 

A girl stood in the doorway that led into the dining¬ 
room adjoining—a curious-looking girl in a gingham 
apron and cap. Lylda looked up. 

“Oh, Eena, please will you say to Oteo we want the 
tree from the wood-shed—in the dining-room.” 

The little maid hesitated. Her mistress smiled and 
added a few words in foreign tongue. The girl disap¬ 
peared. 

“Every window gets a holly wreath,” the Doctor said. 
“They’re in a box outside in the wood-shed.” 

“Look what Eve got,” said the Big Business Man, and 
produced from his pocket a little folded object which he 
opened triumphantly into a long serpent of filigree red 
paper on a string with little red and green paper bells 
hanging from it. “Across the doorway,” he added, wav¬ 
ing his hand. 

A moment after there came a stamping of feet on the 
porch outside, and then the banging of an outer door. A 
young man and girl burst into the room, kicking the 





338 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

snow from their feet and laughing. The youth carried 
two pairs of ice-skates slung over his shoulder; as he 
entered the room he flung them clattering to the floor. 

The girl, even at first glance, was extraordinarily pretty. 
She was small and very slender of build. She wore stout 
high-laced tan shoes, a heavy woollen skirt that fell to her 
shoe-tops and a short, belted coat, with a high collar but¬ 
toned tight about her throat. She was covered now with 
snow. Her face and the locks of hair that strayed from 
under her knitted cap were soaking wet. 

'‘He threw me down,” she appealed to the others. 

“I didn’t—she fell.” 

“You did; into the snow you threw me—off the road.” 
She laughed. “But I am learning to skate.” 

“She fell three times,” said her companion accusingly. 

“Twice only, it was,” the girl corrected. She pulled 
off her cap, and a great mass of black hair came tumbling 
down about her shoulders. 

Lylda, from her chair before the fire, smiled mischie¬ 
vously. 

“Aura, my sister,” she said in a tone of gentle reproof. 
“So immodest it is to show all that hair.” 

The girl in confusion began gathering it up. 

“Don’t you let her tease you, Aura,” said the Big Busi¬ 
ness Man. “It’s very beautiful hair.” 

“Where’s Loto?” asked the Very Young Man, pulling 
off his hat and coat. 

“In bed—see his stocking there.” 

A childish treble voice was calling from upstairs. 
“Good night, Aura—good night, my friend Jack.” 

“Good night, old man—see you to-morrow,” the Very 
Young Man called back in answer. 

“You mustn’t make so much noise,” the Doctor said 
reprovingly. “He’ll never get to sleep.” 


The First Christmas 


339 

“No, you mustn’t/’ the Big Business Man agreed. 
“To-morrow’s a very very big day for him.” 

“Some Christmas,” commented the Very Young Man 
looking around. “Where’s the holly and stuff?” 

“Oh, we’ve got it all right, don’t you worry,” said the 
Banker. 

“And mistletoe,” said Lylda, twinkling. “For you, 
Jack.” 

Eena again stood in the doorway and said something to 
her mistress. “The tree is ready,” said Lylda. 

The Chemist rose to his feet. “Come on, everybody; 
let’s go trim it.” 

They crowded gaily into the dining-room, leaving the 
Very Young Man and Aura sitting alone by the fire. For 
some time they sat silent, listening to the laughter of the 
others trimming the tree. 

The Very Young Man looked at the girl beside him as 
she sat staring into the fire. She had taken off her heavy 
coat, and her figure seemed long and very slim in the 
clothes she was wearing now. She sat bending forward, 
with her hands clasped over her knees. The long line of 
her slender arm and shoulder, and the delicacy of her pro¬ 
file turned towards him, made the Very Young Man re¬ 
alize anew how fragile she was, and how beautiful. 

Her mass of hair was coiled in a great black pile on her 
head, with a big, loose knot low at the neck. The iri¬ 
descence of her skin gleamed under the flaming red of her 
cheeks. Her lips, too, were red, with the smooth, rich 
red of coral. The Very Young Man thought with a 
shock of surprise that he had never noticed before that 
they were red; in the ring there had been no such color. 

In the room adjoining, his friends were proposing a 
toast over the Christmas punch bowl. The Chemist’s 
voice floated in through the doorway. 



340 The Girl in the Golden Atom 

“To the Oroids—happiness to them.” Then for an 
instant there was silence as they drank the toast. 

Aura met the Very Young Man's eyes and smiled a 
little wanly. “Happiness—to them! I wonder. We 
who are so happy to-night—I wonder, are they?” 

The Very Young Man leaned towards her. “You are 
happy, Aura?” 

The girl nodded, still staring wistfully into the fire. 

“I want you to be,” the Very Young Man added simply, 
and fell silent. 

A blazing log in the fire twisted and rolled to one side; 
the crackling flames leaped higher, bathing the girl’s 
drooping little figure in their golden light. 

The Very Young Man after a time found himself mur¬ 
muring familiar lines of poetry. His memory leaped 
back. A boat sailing over a silent summer lake—under¬ 
neath the stars—the warmth of a girl’s soft little body 
touching his—her hair, twisted about his fingers—the 
thrill in his heart; he felt it now as his lips formed the 
words: 

“The stars would be your pearls upon a string, 

The world a ruby for your finger-ring, 

And you could have the sun and moon to wear, 

If I were king.” 

“You remember, Aura, that night in the boat?” 

Again the girl nodded. “I shall learn to read it—some 
day,” she said eagerly. “And all the others that you told 
me. I want to. They sing—so beautifully.” 

A sleigh passed along the road outside; the jingle of 
its bells drifted in to them. The Very Young Man 
reached over and gently touched the girl’s hand; her fin¬ 
gers closed over his with an answering pressure. His 
heart was beating fast. 

“Aura,” he said earnestly. “I want to be King—for 


The First Christmas 341 

you—this first Christmas and always. I want to give 
you—all there is in this life, of happiness, that I can give 
—just for you.” 

The girl met his gaze with eyes that were melting with 
tenderness. 

“I love you, Aura,” he said softly. 

“I love you, too, Jack,” she whispered, and held her 
lips up to his. 


THE END 








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